Forgive My Ignorance
by Formidable Muse
Summary: It's been two months since Detective Wilden's murder and things are still under investigation. Hannah's been on pins and needles dealing with her current situation. Spencer is hiding something from everyone and it's only so long until her secret comes out. Aria seems to be in a good place for once or is she? And Emily, well there's a lot going on there... *This is a Spemily fic.
1. Champagne in Plastic Cups

**Summary:** It's been 2 months since Detective Wilden's murder and it's still under investigation. Hannah's walking on pins and needles trying to cover for a murder that her mother may or may not have committed. Spencer is stressing about College and not achieving the perfect future she's been dreaming of her entire life. Aria's with Jake, you know, that hot martial arts _teacher_, she's finally in a good place, right? And Emily, poor Em has a lot going on, Child protective services are still keeping an eye on her family, swimming is a dicey subject as Em hasn't set foot in the water since her accident and on top of that, things with Paige are unnecessarily tense. Graduation is coming up and the Liars are wondering if they will ever have a chance at a normal life.

**A/N:** I plan on using everything from the show up until now and than going in my own direction from here. I have ideas for couples and sub-stories and all that jazz. It's probably not the most original story, but I do plan to add some twists here and there.

**PS. This is a Spemily fic, so my focus will be mostly on Spencer and Emily. **

[I own nothing, not the characters, not the general story (just the ideas behind the fic) and all that yada yada. Not going to repeat it, just wanted to put it out there to begin.]

* * *

Rain pelted the chalky gray side walk as Spencer Hastings made her way to the Apple Rose Grille; it was an unusual day in Rosewood as a layer of fog clouded the dark sky. Spencer woke up with a massive migraine and an uneasy feeling about last nights events. The uneasy feeling being caused by the fact that the brunette couldn't remember anything that happened last night, alcohol tends to have that affect.

Spencer was meeting one of her best friends, Emily Fields, at the grille at 11:30am. Spencer was early, as usually, she sat down at one of the tables in the back of the restaurant, pulled out her cell phone to check the time and than obsessively started rearranging the jelly packets by flavor and expiration date.

Her mind was racing as she tried to recollect the order of events from the previous night. Spencer, Emily and her other best friends Aria Montgomery and Hannah Marin spent the evening in the Hastings' lake house. They spent a majority of the night discussing the possibility of who A could be. Spencer made a graph and chart of potential 'suspects'. They knew quite a bit more than they did a few months ago. Thanks to Mona Vanderwaal.

Mona informed them of everything she knew before getting sent back to Radly Sanitarium. She went back willingly, almost too willingly, after being accused of stalking Jenna Marshall. They shipped Mona back without even opening a case.

After hours of going in circles about the new 'A', who killed Wilden, and the whole Red coat predicament; they decided to settle for alcohol and a movie. At some point, things got fuzzy. Spencer woke up alone in the Cabin; with a note from the others saying that they would talk later. It was 10:30 once she called Emily asking if they could meet up. Spencer wanted to know the details of last night's events; she was concerned as to why her memory was hazy. She only had a glass of wine, it shouldn't have even been enough to make her feel the alcohol, let alone blur her memory.

"Hey Spence," Emily said as she sat her bag on the ground by the table, she seemed to be in an unusually good mood. Emily swept her hair back as she took a seat across from her friend. Spencer stared briefly trying to understand Emily's chipperness, especially since Emily seemed kind of depressed last night. Maybe things with her girlfriend, Paige McCullers, were back to normal.

"Hey. You seem chipper."

"How observant Ms. Hastings, I just got out from the Doctors and he said that I need to schedule a physical and then after that I can start swimming again." Emily said grinning, she was psyched that she was almost able to get back in the water, training was going to be brutal, especially to get back to where she was but it's what she wanted to do. Emily couldn't imagine a life without swimming and these past few months helped her to realize it.

"I'm really happy for you, Em." Spencer smiled as she put her hand on Emily's. A spark boiled in Spencer's stomach at the touch, it made her feel nauseated.

"Thanks. How are you this morning?" Emily asked slowly, she was confused by the look in Spencer's eyes.

"I'm… good. Do you know what happened last night? I can't remember a thing." She went straight to the point, as always.

"No, I don't remember much." Emily said looking down at her hands as Spencer's gaze cut into her. It was a lie, Emily remembered basically everything that happened last night, but it wasn't something up for discussion. "Do you remember anything at all, Em? I only had a glass of Zinfandel; it shouldn't have been enough to even feel anything. But I feel nothing, other than an unexplained feeling of guilt and an overwhelming migraine."

Emily smiled at Spencer's contradiction, "The last thing I remember is you licking salt off of Aria's neck. You had a lot to drink, Spence, we all did."

Spencer stared at Emily in confusion, "I only had a glass of wine. Did you have any?"

"No, you were the only one and you had more than a glass, you drank the entire bottle… you seriously don't remember? Where did the wine even come from? Hannah didn't bring it."

"Toby brought it to the cabin last weekend; we didn't have time to drink it though." Spencer said absentmindedly. Emily blushed at the thought of what she and Toby were probably doing last weekend. Spencer didn't notice as thoughts consumed her. _Toby? He brought the wine, maybe he tampered with it? NO. Toby would never do that. He was working with A, as in was in the past. But that's when A was Mona, he was doing it for me, for us, to find Red Coat and put an end to this bullshit. It's over now though, we have no leads and A is a mystery again... It had to have been A. Now wait, I did what with Ari-_

"Spencer, you don't think that… Toby could hav-"

"No. It had to have been A." Spencer snapped a bit harshly cutting Emily off. It irritated her that the thought even crossed her mind.

Emily was taken aback by Spencer's quick and somewhat hostile reaction, "But why, what would A accomplish by drugging you?"

"How should I know, apparently I was too busy licking salt off Aria's neck to notice anything else," Spencer said sarcastically as she smirked at Emily, "Anything else I should know about?"

"No…Is that the only reason you called me?"

"Well, yeah." Spencer said her mind still elsewhere, she was browsing through the menu unsure of if she was actually hungry or not. Coffee sounded good, lots of coffee.

"Oh. I guess I'll go then."

Spencer noticed the sadness in Emily's tone, "You don't want to stay and talk? I could flag the waitress down if you want to order something? How are things with you and Paige?" She rambled, unaware of the recent issues going on.

Emily clinched her teeth, "Fine, just fine. Spencer, I should go. I'll leave you with your thoughts." She stood up and grabbed her bag off the ground, pushed her chair in and plastered on a fake smile.

"Um okay, I'll talk to you later then?"

"Sure." Emily walked out, irritated, she pushed the Grille's door open with force, it was still raining and it tickled as it brushed down her skin. She wasn't going anywhere in particular, just away from Spencer. It shouldn't have even bothered her that all Spencer wanted was some answers, it was typical of her. But it was the fact that she didn't seem to even want Emily there in the first place, she was giving off that vibe.

Things between Emily and Spencer have been off lately. Emily's been worried about her, especially with Spencer's rejection from UPenn, she hadn't been taking it well at all. But there had to be more to the story than that, Spencer was keeping something from her. Every time Emily saw her, she always looked distant and somewhat afraid. Last night was the first night in months that Spencer seemed like Spencer and that's because she was intoxicated. And it really didn't help matters that Spencer kissed Emily. It was a drunken kiss (so it wasn't technically cheating on anyone) and shouldn't have meant much, but god was it passionate. And Emily couldn't seem to get it out of her mind, she felt a bit guilty about how much it was consuming her thoughts as well as how much she enjoyed Spencer's body pressed up against hers.

_Emily walked down the hallway into the Kitchen to get a glass of water, her stomach burning from all the shots she just took. She grabbed a 'world's greatest dad' mug out off the cup rack and turned on the faucet. As the water was running Emily looked out the kitchen window into the darkness, suddenly a figure appeared in the reflection, it was Spencer. _

_Spencer stood behind Emily until she turned around, she was staring at her with a strange look in her eye. "Are you alright Spence?" Emily was concerned, her mind racing. Spencer didn't respond, she walked up to Emily, grabbed her wrists and pushed her gently into the counter. "Emily, I-I think I'm in love with you." Their eyes locked, and tension rose between them as they stared into each others eyes. Spencer leaned in slowly and brushed her lips softly against Emily's until she deepened the embrace, it only lasted a minute until Spencer pulled away. Fear in her eyes or maybe even lust…_

Emily shook the evening from her mind, and made her way back to her house to see Aria sitting on the porch swing, "Em, there you are. I've been trying to call you, is everything alright?" Aria said, concern flooding her face. Emily took a seat next to her on the swing, "I'm fine. I was with Spencer at the Grille, she had a few questions," Emily said, she smoothed her hair back with her hand and tried sweeping it to the side of her shoulder, "You remember everything that happened last night, right?"

"We discussed A, and all the other _lovely_ things that are ruining our lives. Had some drinks, took some shots and passed out. Well, I passed out; I think Hannah turned on a movie or something. Why, you don't remember?" Aria knitted her eyebrows in concern; the look on Emily's face was unnerving.

"I do. Spencer doesn't remember a thing though, she said she only had a glass of wine and then things went hazy after that." At that moment Emily's phone chimed with a new text message,

**Ever heard of an instigator, Em? Well I'm just getting started.  
****-A**

"Who's it from?" Aria asked while studying Emily's face, there was no reaction she just looked at the screen. "Who the hell do you think?" Emily said, slamming her phone down on the bench. She stood up flustered, lately Emily would get really angry, really quickly and it was hard to calm down once it happened. Little things would trigger it and it was starting to really bother her, especially since most of the time it was over nothing.

Aria read the text, puzzled by the meaning, "Why would A drug Spencer?" Aria said, more to herself than to Emily. "I don't know, Aria," Emily sat back down on the swing, her tone changed from anger to defeat, "Why does A do anything that she does? She has already ruined basically every aspect of my life. I guess its Spencer's turn."

"No, we are all under attack, Em." Aria wrapped her arm around her best friend and pulled her in close, "But things are going to be okay, we still have each other and nothing can change that." Surprisingly, it brought Emily comfort, especially to know that she would always have Aria in her life to pick her up. Emily laid her head on Aria's shoulder and closed her eyes; they sat in silence as the swing swayed gently from the wind.

The front door swung opened and Pam Fields walked out, carrying a small sack of garbage in her hands. She stopped to look at Aria and Emily for a moment, something was clearly wrong. Lately, Emily had been opening up a lot to her mother. Things between them had been really good, especially after clearing up the whole 'child services thing'. Emily told her mom that someone at school was out to get her and after Mona got sent back to Radly, she was the perfect person to pin the blame on. At least to ease her parent's worry, there was no way Emily was telling the police it was Mona. Because it wasn't and she didn't want the wrath of whoever the hell A was to suddenly lash out and make the situation worse. For all Emily knew, Mona could very well still be A. She could be working with Red Coat and putting on a huge facade, that seemed to be working for the most part.

"Emily, honey, is everything alright?" Pam asked, startling Aria out of a daze, making Emily jump too. Pam stared back and forth at them for a brief moment, wondering how long they had been out here like this.

"Yeah, things are alright." Emily lied, knowing her mother would push for more, she continued, "Things with Paige and I are kind of rocky, we had a fight on Friday and haven't spoken since. But it's fine."

"Okay honey, well if you want to talk about it later, you know where to find me." Emily smiled at her mother and nodded. Pam tossed the bag into the garbage can that was hidden beside the porch, "It's nice seeing you Aria." Pam added as she pulled the front door closed.

"What's really going on between you and Paige?" Aria asked, pulling out of their comfortable embrace to look at Emily. Emily scowled as her heart sank, she didn't want to talk about Paige, and she didn't want to think about their fight or why they weren't talking, "We had an argument on Friday."

"I got that much. What about?" Aria pushed, hoping to get Emily to open up about it. They had grown a lot closer in the past few months. They've always been 'close', like best friends are, but they just recently started bonding in a different way. Aria thinks it's because Spencer has been so weird lately, but she was happy to get to spend more alone time with Emily. It was on a different level than when the four of them were together.

Emily looked away from Aria and stared out toward the Fields' mailbox, the little red flag was up and internally it made Emily wonder if it was a sign. She continued to look out towards it while she spoke, "Paige thinks that Spencer has joined the A team for real this time. She thinks it's to save Toby, and that betraying us is the only option."

* * *

**A/N: That's as far as I'm getting for now. I want to update a couple times a week, maybe more depending on if people are actually interested or not. Comments, critique, reviews, suggestions, anything is really appreciated. I'm in the process of trying to become a better writer and to find a writing style that suites me, anything and everything helps. Talk to me (:**


	2. Strippers Only Make Life Harder

**A/N: Hey everyone, thanks for the reviews as well as the Pm's (hehe). Umm anyway, I know the story may seem kind of slow, but I have a lot I want to add in and don't really want to consolidate it all together (If that makes any since). And I'll be making the chapters after this a bit longer as well, sorry the first two were so short, I'm still deciding where exactly I want to take this. Also, sorry I didn't update sooner, my brother's wedding was this weekend and things have been crazy around here with parties and clean up and all that jazz. **

**Oh one more thing, this is rated M, so as the story progresses I will be adding mature content, probably quite a bit of it too, just a warning. Thanks for reading (:**

* * *

Hannah Marin sat restlessly on the living room couch, she was watching a Jersey Shore rerun on mute, for some odd reason not even known to her. She spent the whole day on that couch, mainly just thinking. Her hair was a disaster, she wore a greased stained, over sized t-shirt and to top it off, a little pimple was starting to form on her previously flawless face. Candy wrappers covered the floor and a half empty tub of ice cream sat on the coffee table beside Hannah's sockless feet.

A few months ago Hannah's mother, Ashley Marin, was one of the prime suspects for the murder of Detective Wilden. Luckily, she was found innocent as leads took the police in a completely different direction leaving them with more dead ends. But deep in Hannah's heart, she knew it was her mother that murdered Wilden; she just wasn't completely sure why she was so torn up about it. Hannah should have been happy that the police were off their case, that Ashley was no longer a suspect and that Wilden was no longer harassing them. But Hannah felt guilt, and fear that A would find some way to make the situation come back to bite her in the ass.

The door bell rang, snapping Hannah out of the trance she was in. She stood up quickly, brushing some crumbs off her shirt and glanced over at the clock, it was already 9 pm. Hannah peered through the little peephole to see Paige McCullers; she was standing outside with her arms crossed. Confused and slightly annoyed to be interrupted, Hannah cracked the front door.

"Paige, Emily's not here." Hannah said, trying to let as little light as possible through the door, she didn't really want Paige seeing what a wreck she was.

"I'm actually here to see you," Paige smiled, taking a step closer to the door in a somewhat seductive manner, "Can I come in?"

Hannah cocked her head slightly to the side and raised an eyebrow, _was Paige flirting?_ Hannah cleared her through, "Now's not really a good time."

"Please, it's really important."

"Fine." Hannah was hesitant for a minute and then let Paige into the dark hallway.

"Can we sit?" Paige asked, gesturing to the living room couch. Hannah scowled at the suggestion, "No, what are you doing here?"

"I thought that you may be more receptive than Emily was… I've been tracing a phone number that's been communicating with someone through anonymous messages, I believe that the person is working for A," Paige said, she paused and waited for a reaction from Hannah.

Hannah stood with her arms crossed; she was slightly annoyed, mainly from the fact that Paige was her talking to her instead of talking with Spencer. (Seeing as Spencer was the one playing Nancy Drew) "And?" Hannah asked, waiting for Paige to continue talking.

"Well, the person who- we traced the phone back to Spencer. She has the phone that's been sending the messages." Paige said. They stood silently for a moment, not breaking eye contact.

"Get out." Hannah said sternly as she pointed at the door. Paige didn't budge she was determined to get the facts out, "Hannah, think about it-"

Hannah cut her off, "Get the hell out of my house, right now Paige!" She was angry at this point. The idea that Spencer, her best friend, could be A was ridiculous. Paige hit a nerve and Hannah wanted to hear nothing more. Paige looked at Hannah like she was going to say something else, but it was met with a death glare. She hesitantly left the house and Hannah slammed the door behind her.

A moment later, Hannah received a text,

**Don't believe a word Paige says, that bitch is crazy.  
****- A**

Hannah quickly opened to front door, she ran out on her porch, but Paige was out of sight. It was pitch black outside, even if anyone was around she wouldn't have seen them. Hannah ran back inside, grabbed her car keys out of the dish and darted out towards her car. She needed to see Spencer.

The drive to the Hastings' was short, but once Hannah pulled up to the house, she saw that Spencer's car was gone. She looked down at her phone with concern; there was no way that Spencer was still working for A. Paige was wrong.

* * *

Emily showed up early for school the following morning, Mondays weren't her thing and before her injury, she would spend the morning swimming, it would help ease her through the day. Not today though, Emily sat alone on the edge of the pool sticking her feet in the water, her mind preoccupied with thoughts of Paige. Emily loved her, but lately Paige had been weird. Not only did she accuse Spencer of being A, but she was also questioning Emily about her future. Now that a swimming scholarship was most likely out the window, Paige was upset that Emily was debating whether or not to going to school with her in San Francisco.

One of the locker room doors slammed shut, startling Emily. She turned around to see Spencer heading her way with two beverages in her hands. Spencer was smiling as she headed towards Emily, "Hey Em, I brought you a latté."

"Thanks. You're here early." Emily said, taking the cup from Spencer as she sat down.

Spencer's expression went from happy to something that Emily couldn't quite put her finger on, guilt maybe? "I wanted to apologize to you, for the way I've been acting. I know that maybe it seems like I don't want you around, but I do. It's just, there is so much going on in my life right now and I haven't been dealing with any of it properly. I've been so depressed and well kind of a bitch. I didn't realize that it was affecting other people, but by the way you stormed out of the Grille on Saturday, it made me realize that I was hurting you. I've been selfish and well, mostly just depressed. I've spent basically the past two months without my best friend and it's killing me inside. I guess I should explain wha-"

Emily tackled Spencer in a hug almost knocking them both in the pool. She wrapped her arms tightly around her, not wanting to let go. Two months of a distant friendship was tearing Emily apart, she missed Spencer, well the Spencer that she knows and loves, not the weird ass zombie Spencer that temporarily replaced Emily's best friend.

"You don't have to explain yourself to me, Spence. I'm just glad that we are speaking like normal people. I was starting to like the drunk you better than the sober one." Emily said, once she pulled out of the embrace.

Spencer chuckled at the comment and glanced down at the water, "I want to explain, you deserve to know." She paused, picking up her coffee to take a drink, as she lifted it to her lips Emily examined her. The colour was back in Spencer's face and the dark circles were not longer plaguing her skin. The life was back in her eyes and they seemed to sparkle in an odd way. Emily couldn't help but notice how beautiful Spencer was, everything about her seemed to jump out at Emily, in a different way than before. She assumed it was because she really missed Spencer and was happy to have her back to normal… That's totally why.

The bell rang the moment Spencer sat her cup back on the cold cement, "Hmm, I kind of forgot that we're at school. Can we talk about this later?"

"Sure, walk me to French class?" She stood up and slipped her shoes back on, Spencer stood up besides her holding both coffees.

Once Spencer and Emily were in the hallway, they saw Hannah standing by the lockers. Her gaze was intense as the girls approached her, she waved hello to Emily as she opened the door to the classroom. Once the door closed, Hannah looked at Spencer, "We need to talk.

"Okay, I'll meet you in the library after class?" Spencer asked, opening her locker to grab her physics book from her backpack.

"I mean now, come on." Hannah gestured towards the bathroom. Spencer looked at her puzzled. Thinking back to the three phone calls she missed from Hannah last night, made her wonder if that was the problem.

After they entered the girl's room, Hannah opened all the stalls to make sure they were alone, and then she turned around to face Spencer, "Where were you last night?"

"Well mother, I was at home studying all evening." Spencer lied in an overly sarcastic tone. Hannah crossed her arms and Spencer felt her gut flinch from fear of being found out.

"You're lying."

"I am not. Toby was with me. Sorry I didn't answer your calls, we were _busy_ _all night_ and by the time we were done, it was pretty late." Spencer said arrogantly, she hoped that Hannah would get distracted by her insinuation of sex and question her about that instead.

"Don't fucking lie to me, Spencer!" Hannah was in her face and Spencer was internally freaking out. Spencer grabbed her shoulders in attempt to calm her down, but Hannah was pissed, "I went by your house, you weren't home. Where were you?"

"I was in Philly." Spencer said in a whisper. Hannah rolled her eyes, not believing that either. "I promise I was in Philly, I have proof. I have a receipt in my purse."

Hannah took a step back, calming down a little bit. She was determined to find out where exactly Spencer was last night, "What were you doing there? And don't lie. I know when you are lying." Hannah said in a stern voice, hoping to sound intimidating.

Colour rushed to Spencer's cheeks, which was definitely an odd sight. She rarely blushed, "I was… at a strip club."

A smile spread across Hannah's face, she took a step back from Spencer, all seriousness gone, "With Toby?"

The shades of Spencer's cheeks continued to darken, "No. I was there alone." She didn't want to say more than she had too, she didn't really want to talk about this now, especially with Hannah.

"Why?"

"I was… curious. Han, I don't really want to talk about it."

"Are you considering becoming a stripper? Because, no offence, but you really don't have the boobs for it. They are so tiny. And don't get me started on your ass." Hannah couldn't help but laugh, she was back to the normal, goofy Hannah that Spencer knew and loved.

"Gee, thanks. Thanks for throwing those dreams out the window," Spencer put her hands on her hips and tried to look crushed.

"Really though, Spence, why were you there?"

"I was curious what they did, like what the job entailed."

"Liar, you're fucking one of them, aren't you?" Hannah grinned; she had a feeling that Spencer might be gay. Anytime they would drink, Spencer would get hella horny and make it known in some way or another. Oh and the way she would look at Emily gave everything away, sober or not, it was terribly obvious that Spencer wanted her.

"What? No!" Spencer defended quickly, she wasn't one for getting embarrassed but this topic got to her.

Hannah poked her in the stomach, "You like pussy, it all makes since now."

"God, Hannah. Can you not use that word?"

"You don't like Pussy? What would you prefer, vagina, uvula, cunt?" Hannah was just messing with Spencer at this point; it always felt nice to make Spencer cringe.

"You're vulgar."

"You're boring."

"Am not. Fine, _pussy_ works." The word rolled awkwardly off of her tongue. Spencer wasn't a virgin; she's had sex and stuff before. But she and Toby didn't really talk 'dirty' or anything along those lines, so it was a bit awkward to use improper terms. Plus she didn't swear much to begin with so that was another thing, "And no I'm not sleeping with anyone besides my wonderful _boyfriend_. I've just never been to a strip club and I was wondering what it would be like."

"That's what Google is for, Spencer. Why were you there? I'm going to get it out of you one way or another," Hannah hopped up to sit on the sink, not taking her eyes off Spencer who was standing right next to her, " Wait, are you gay?"

"No. Well, I'm confused okay…" Spencer stopped talking as the bathroom door swung open. The girl that came in looked at them briefly before going into the stall. A few seconds later the bell rang. Spencer looked at the stalls and then back to Hannah, "We aren't done talking about this, are we?"

Hannah smiled and patted Spencer's shoulder as she slid off the sink, "No we are not. But I believe that it's time for lunch, we'll talk about this later, after school."

Spencer followed Hannah out into the hallway and they stopped at the lockers, "Ok, I have a question before we meet up with Aria and Emily. Why the hell were you interrogating me like a criminal?"

"Oh, that. Sorry, I got distracted. I'll tell you that, once you explain what's going on with the whole 'liking pussy' thing."

* * *

**A/N: I'm considering jumping into First Person POV, any thoughts on that?**


	3. Blindsided

**A/N: Happy PLL Day everyone!**

* * *

"I don't understand, is it pronounced Fuh-uk or P-u-k thai?" Mike Montgomery pondered as he closed the passenger door of Aria's car.

Aria snickered at Mike's question; she didn't really have an answer though. Who names a restaurant Phuk Thai anyway? The name bound to Fuh-uk with everyone's verbal skills.

It was takeout night and seeing as it was only Mike and Aria tonight, they were trying the new Thai place that opened a few blocks away from their house.

Their father, Byron, was working late again. The past few weeks he's buried himself in grading tests and reworking the current curriculum he's teaching at the University. Aria thinks it's because her mother, Ella, just left. Byron and Ella have been divorced for quite a while now, but Ella just recently (two weeks ago) left on a trip with her boyfriend to a different Country. And with her off taking a break from reality, it made since for Byron to be a bit jealous or even depressed at the fact that his ex-wife is really moving on and he had yet to.

Aria and Mike made their way into the new restaurant, as they were walking towards the counter to pick up their food. Aria noticed her erm-friend, Jake, sitting at one of the tables with an extremely beautiful woman. Jake and Aria had been out on quite a few dates now, but had yet to label their relationship. She liked him a lot, but there was still something standing in the way of discussing how serious they should get. She just wasn't ready to commit and seeing Jake with another woman, made Aria think that he wasn't either.

"Aria?" Mike asked, bringing her back to reality. She had been staring at Jake's table the entire time Mike was talking to the lady at the counter, Aria looked at Mike, confused for a brief moment, Mike continued to speak, "She said it's pronounced Huck Thai, the P is silent. Are you going to pay or what?"

"Sorry." Aria pulled the money out of her purse and handed it to Mike, she glanced back at the table and Jake made eye contact with her. He smiled lightly as he recognized her and stood up to head towards her and Mike.

Aria's heart started pounding; she wasn't sure what to say, "Hey Jake." He wrapped Aria in a hug and whispered in her ear, "Hello beautiful."

Mike stood beside them confused, as far as he knew; Aria and Ezra Fitz were still secretly hooking up. He'd been out of the loop for quite a while now, but then again, he didn't spend as much time with his sister as he should have. Which he felt guilty about; he hasn't been the best brother. After Jake and Aria pulled out from the hug, Jake looked at Mike, Aria decided to take the opportunity to introduce them so that he wouldn't get the wrong idea about Mike, "Jake, this is my brother Mike." They shook hands.

"Nice to meet you Mike. I didn't want to make her get up, but my cousin Anya just moved to town. She's sitting at the table over there." Jake pointed and Anya waved at them. Aria looked down to notice that Anya had a cast on her left foot, and then she noticed the crutches beside the table. Her heart sank, as she realized how far she was jumping to conclusions about the girl.

Jake noticed Mike eyeing her, "She's single, you know. Maybe one night this week we could go for a double date or something?"

Mike smiled, "I'm free anytime."

They both looked at Aria, who was still looking at the girl, "Yeah that sounds good. How about I call you?" Aria asked, looking back to Jake. He nodded and pulled Aria in for another hug, "I look forward to it and it was nice meeting you Mike."

"Likewise," Mike said as Jake started to head back to his table.

Aria's phone beeped as she and Mike were walking out to the car, he heart stopped as she quickly pulled out her phone. Relief washed through her as she realized it was from Hannah.

**Hannah: Can you come over to Spencer's in an hour?**

**Aria: Sure Han, I thought we were doing this later tonight?**

**Hannah: It needs to be asap**

* * *

Hannah sat impatiently on Spencer's bed, waiting for her to get out of the bathroom. She arrived a few minutes prior and used the spare key to get inside.

Hannah, Emily and Aria were suppose to meet at Spencer's by 5pm, but Hannah was early, she wanted to continue the conversation that she and Spencer were having earlier that day, before her friends arrived. The bathroom door opened and Spencer froze like a deer in headlights, her heart rate rapidly increasing, "Jeeze Hannah. Are you trying to give me a heart attack?"

"I thought we could continue our conversation from earlier, I wanted to talk before Em and Aria gets here, plus scaring you is always a perk." Hannah giggled as Spencer glared at her. Hannah sat up on Spencer's bed and gestured for Spencer to sit. She sat down in the chair across the room instead of by Hannah, and looked outside the window, trying to figure out what to say to her friend.

"So why'd you go to the strip club Spence?" Hannah's gaze cut into the side of Spencer's face. Hannah was dying to know what was going on in Spencer's head. She decided that once Spencer admits that she's gay, Hannah would do what ever it takes to hook Emily and Spencer up, it was meant to be, they just didn't know it yet.

"I told you, I was curious."

"I need some details."

"How am I supposed to give you details when I don't really know why? I can't even figure this out myself, how do you expect me to explain it to you?" Spencer said, she was angry, not at Hannah but at herself. It didn't make since to her. Spencer was in a good place as far a relationships go. She had Toby, the smartest, most attractive man that she had ever met. He loved Spencer and has done so much for her. They were in love and had a great relationship. So why was she questioning her feelings?

Hannah was quiet for a moment, actually thinking before speaking (a rather new occurrence), her tone changed from questioning to compassion, "Spencer, I bet talking through things will help. What exactly are you trying to figure out?"

Spencer was surprised by Hannah's take on things. Earlier in the bathroom, Spencer assumed that Hannah was just being nosey, but now it seemed like she actually wanted to help. It was clear that Hannah loved Spencer and vise versa, but their relationship had always been more on the shallow side. They would talk about deep things, but never alone and never in such a serious manner. It may have just been the specific topic that made things seem different, but who knows.

"I've been… having these dreams, basically all night every night for the past few months. Some of them I'm just watching everything that's happening, but other's I am actually in and they feel so real."

"Dreams about?" Hannah asked, knowing what Spencer meant but wanting to hear it from her.

"God, I feel like a little kid, not being able to talk about something because it's embarrassing. I'm fantastic with words, I have trophies to prove it, but for some reason, I can't talk about this. "

"You could close your eyes."

"Not helping, Han… Okay, I've been having wet dreams about women."

"Anyone in specific?"

"Not you, if that's what you are getting at."

"Soo, you went to a strip club because you are having wet dreams? I don't think that's going to help get rid of them." Hannah was trying to lighten the mood a little bit. She wanted Spencer to loosen up, so it might be easier to talk about it.

"I wanted to see if it seeing it in real life would turn me on as much as my dreams do. I mean, I love Toby, so much, he's been my rock and I've never met a guy that understands me the way he does…" Spencer trailed off, not knowing where to go from there.

"But?"

"But I'm not sexually attracted to him. I've never been sexually attracted to any guy, emotionally attracted, physical, intellectual, yes. But never sexual and I thought that having sex with him would help with that, but it hasn't. It's only made things worse, when he touches me, I think about what it would be like to do that to a woman. When he kisses me, I fantasize about being with someone else. And I can't handle it anymore; I don't know what to do." Spencer was crying, she hated crying, but she hadn't realized how bottled up everything was. It felt good to get it out.

Hannah slid off the bed and hopped into the chair with Spencer and wrapped her arms around her, it was an awkwardly positioned hug, but it was still a hug. They sat the for a little while before Hannah spoke again, "Spence, I love you. And if you like women, than I'm happy for you. But you have to let Toby go…it's the only thing that's going to give you peace about the situation. Look at Emily; you see how free she is. Think back to when she was dating Ben like a million years ago. She was in the same boat as you are now. Maybe she didn't love Ben the way you love Toby, but she went through the same thing, with the same feelings. She had to accept the way that she was feeling." Hannah said, not moving out of their embrace.

"I can accept that I'm gay, I kind of have already and saying all this out loud is confirming it. It's just Toby; I don't want to lose him." Spencer sniffled and Hannah pulled away to look at her, "Toby will understand, he loves you Spence. Just let him know how much you value his friendship, he may be mad at first but you're Spencer Hastings, he won't want to lose that."

"Thanks Hannah, I'm really glad that you harassed me to open up. This morning I was going to ask Emily something's about the whole 'being gay' thing, but I'm glad we talked instead, I think it was a lot easier than talking to Em would have been. So thank you for being an ass." Spencer smiled and hugged her again.

"Are you going to tell her how you feel about her?"

"Emily? What no, I don't have feelings for Emily."

"You can tell me that you are gay, but not that you have feelings for Em? Fine, I'll just have to wait until you guys hook up to say I told you so. Unless... you already have?" Hannah said smugly.

"We haven't!" Spencer said a bit too quickly, she blushed realizing that she just made it extremely obvious that there are feelings there, but no hooking up, there's been none of that, "_Okay_ Hannah. Now you need to tell me what you originally jumped me for earlier." Spencer said, Hannah looked down her expression going from soft and sympathetic to irritated.

A knock on the door came from downstairs, Hannah stood up, "I'll let them in, and you might want to clean up your face a bit before coming downstairs. That's what I wanted us all to talk about."

Spencer walked into her bathroom as Hannah headed downstairs. It was weird, everything that just happened. Opening up to Hannah was a new thing, at least in the way that just went down. But it was nice, a nice weird. Spencer looked in the mirror, her face was puffy from crying and her mascara was splotched across her cheeks. It felt great to admit to someone all the things that she was feeling, better Hannah than Emily.

After fixing her makeup, Spencer nervously made her way downstairs to see her friends sitting on the kitchen barstools. They had already gotten drinks from the fridge, so no need for her to offer. Emily looked up at her and smiled, "Hi Spence."

"Hey Em, Aria." Spencer said as she sat down besides Emily. Hannah smiled a knowing smile at Spencer, making her stomach churn; she cleared her throat and spoke again "So what is it that we _need _to talk about?"

Aria, Emily and Hannah had discussed the issue during lunch. Spencer disappeared into the library in order to avoid Hannah, so it gave the other time to talk. Hannah was supposed to be the one to tell Spencer but after their conversation just now upstairs, Hannah didn't want to be the one to piss her off. And she didn't want it to seem like she was accusing Spencer of anything, because she knew it couldn't be true.

Hannah looked at Aria and then to Emily, "Em, why don't you tell her?"

Emily looked at Hannah, surprised, she didn't want to, but figured someone had to say something or there would be no way to resolve the issue, "Spencer, Paige thinks you are still working with A." Spencer's jaw dropped at the idea of that, Emily continued, "She said that she and Caleb have been tracking a phone that's been sending anonymous texts and that they traced it back to you.

"You can't be serious," Spencer said, clinching her jaw, "You guys don't believe that do you?"

"Of course not Spence, it's just that she's being really persistent about it. She even called me this morning before school and that was after Emily told me. She said according to the tracker, you have it right now." Aria said.

"Wait, she said nothing about Caleb to me last night." Hannah looked at Emily, confused as to why Caleb was mentioned.

Spencer stood up and started pacing back and forth, she wasn't A, she didn't have A's phone. So that must mean that it's somewhere in the house, it was the only explanation, "Maybe, A's been in my house. She could have been texting from here, start looking around."

Spencer ran upstairs and started tossing everything out of her dresser, looking for the phone. If it was here, she was determined to find it. Aria followed after Spencer and started looking in the bathroom, in the cupboards and in the draws. And Hannah and Emily looked around downstairs.

After 20 minutes of looking Spencer's phone received a text message, she quickly opened it,

**Getting warmer.  
****Meet me at Ali's grave tonight at midnight, come alone.  
****And don't even think about telling the other Bitches or you are going to start to look really guilty.  
****-A**

Spencer slammed her phone shut and shoved it back into her front pocket. Emily walked into the room to see Spencer sitting on her bed, with a defeated look on her face. Emily sat down beside her and wrapped an arm around her shoulder, "We'll figure this out Spence. I'll call Paige and she can get us the feed on exactly where the phone is."

Spencer's stomach knotted up from Emily's touch, she stood up to pace some more and well, to pull her mind away from touching Emily. It was a huge distraction, anytime Emily was near, Spencer couldn't think straight. It wasn't exactly a new thing, but up until now Spencer was afraid to admit it to herself, especially since they were both currently in a relationship.

_Focus Spencer, we need to figure this out. _She repeated in her mind a few times before turning to look at Emily, "Don't call Paige. Hannah should call Caleb, he'll be more useful, plus he's better with technology." Spencer said, hoping she wouldn't upset Emily.

"Alright. I'll go tell Hannah." Emily left the room, leaving Spencer alone with her thoughts again. She pulled her phone out to read the text from A once more. _Getting warmer?_

* * *

Spencer pulled the hood of her sweatshirt over her head as she exited her vehicle. It was 11:50, A or whoever the hell she was meeting would be here in about 10 minutes. She spent the past hour in a half sitting in her car just waiting, hoping she would walk away from this alive and hopefully with some answers. It was a stupid thing to do, A could potentially murder her, she knew that. But she needed answers, they needed answers.

_Was this current A working with Red Coat, were they the same person. Did Red Coat kill Ally? Red Coat was one of Ally's disguises, so they obviously had some sort of interaction. Was Ally still alive? No. We saw here body, she's dead and someone is just fucking with us. It has to be the masks. Eh, creepy masks. What if it's Melissa? No. She said she's protecting us, but what does that even mean?_ Spencer's mind was in frenzy as she walked to the place where Ally was originally buried. She assumed that's what A meant, there was no way they were going into the tomb place tonight, it was too open and light.

Once Spencer was near the grave, the bushes ruffled behind her.

_Snap_.

Whispers came from the opposite direction.

Spencer turned around quickly, her eyes darting across her surroundings.

_Whir._

_Snap._

She jumped and whipped around to see a figure standing a few feet behind her. Her heartbeat accelerated, she took a step back as the figure walked closed.

"Don't come any closer!" Spencer yelled as she kept stepping further away.

"Spencer?" The voice called confusion in the tone, Spencer stopped in her tracks, it was a voice she knew all to well.

"Jenna?"

* * *

**A/N: Thanks for reading, any thoughts so far? Thoughts on who A is? Oh and btw, there will be a whole lot more Spemily in the next chapter, but there will also be some drama, just keep that in mind (:**

**Thank you all for the comments; I wanted to reply to them down here rather than at the beginning. So that I could do it individually. **

**Obsessedpllfan: Thank you for the in-depth comment on the story, it's much appreciated. I always love to hear when people understand my wordplay, it's a good feeling. I'll work on getting inside their heads, I've never written fanfiction before, or really anything longer than a short story, so I may no be the best at it, but I'll figure out how to do so. I'm also working on making them longer, I just didn't want to give away anything before now, because like I said, I have some plot twists coming up soon (:**

**Ana: Thanks for your comment, I'll stick with the POV I have and just work with it. **

**Guest: I hope that works for Aria, I love her character and will be adding her in here and there. **

**Breyanaxo: Thanks, I've always been a huge fan of Spencer and Hannah's relationship. The way they interact with each other is very different. I hope this chapter doesn't seem too unrealistic as far as their relationship goes, but I figured showing a different side of Hannah as well as a sensitive side of Spencer might be nice. I feel like she is portrayed somewhat insensitive and selfish on the show and she should have the chance to express more, if that makes any sense. Idk. I hope I answered your other question in the chapter. **

**Sara1287: I'm going to be updating every few days or so. If I didn't have to work, I'd spend my days writing.**

**And thank you everyone else that reviewed my first chapter, I appreciate you all taking the time to do so (:**


	4. Duck, Duck, Goose!

**A/N: This is a short chapter. Definitely not what I was planning on posting today, but wanted to get something out there. I'm hoping to get at least 16 new reviews before I update. I know that people are reading, it has a crazy amount of views so far which is awesome, but I want to know if people actually want me to continue the story and are following it. Whiny, I know, but hey writing is a lot of work. **

**Breyanaxo: Thank you, I'm glad it didn't seem unrealistic. Your review made me smile as those ideas did cross my mind, I'm afraid I shall give nothing away at the moment. I appreciate your comments. Hope you like this chapter (:**

* * *

"Spencer, what are you doing here?" Jenna asked, clearly puzzled by her appearance. Spencer took a step closer to get a better view of Jenna's face; she was wearing a navy blue sweater with her hood pulled tightly over her head, just as Spencer was. Spencer stood up a little straighter, trying to show that she wasn't afraid.

"I'm wondering the same thing about you, Jenna." Spencer's tone was sharp, she'd always known Jenna was apart of things somehow, she just wasn't exactly sure where she fit into the picture.

The bushes rattled behind Spencer and she turned around quickly. It was just the wind ruffling the tree branches together. She turned back to face Jenna, still waiting for a response.

"I'm… meeting someone here, and yourself?" Jenna said calmly, she took a seat on the bench near one of the creepy old statues. Her back facing the woods, giving Spencer an advantage to spot anyone who could potentially be back there. Jenna didn't seem afraid, but maybe she had been putting on a face as Spencer was? She didn't know.

"I am meeting someone as well, I thought it might be you, but you seem just as surprised to see me as I am, you," Spencer glanced behind her and then made direct eye contact with Jenna, her mind racing with questions, she wanted to stay as collected as possible, "You don't seem afraid."

"Why would I be?" Jenna's tone a bit arrogant, Spencer crossed her arms and pulled them closely into her chest.

"It's midnight, we are in a cemetery. I think there are a lot of reason's a person would be afraid."

"Are you afraid, Spencer?" The question sent a chill down Spencer's spine, of course she was afraid, terrified actually, especially because things weren't going as she planned. She had thought through a million scenarios before coming here, came up with ideas as to what to do in the case A tried to attack her, or what to do in general even what to say. But she had never expected to see Jenna Marshall, the thought that she would show up hadn't even crossed her mind.

"I'm going to cut to the chase, are you A?" Spencer said, raising her voice slightly.

Jenna laughed, it sounded more nervous than condescending and then she spoke lowering the tone in her voice to a whisper, "You would think that." Jenna stood up and looked around her surroundings before looking back at Spencer, "I'm going to assume that you think you are meeting this A person here, don't you? Well you aren't. At the moment, I'm a couple steps a head of everything, for the most part." Jenna stopped talk to observe Spencer's reaction but didn't give her time to speak, "Paige will be here at 12:30, she's going to notice us talking before we see her and she's going to take a picture and use it as proof that you are A and-"

"So Paige is A?" Spencer asked cutting her off mid-sentence. Everything in Spencer gut has been telling her that since the beginning, it's the only thing that made since. Paige had to be A, how else would she be getting inside knowledge about everything that's going on.

"No, she's not. I thought you were the smart one, Spencer. I guess I was wrong, you are so wrapped up in things that you're missing the bigger picture." Jenna said inhaling deeply; she looked around again, now she looked nervous.

"You're here for me, you sent that text. Why?" Spencer asked quickly, she felt like Jenna was going to disappear for some reason, that she didn't have much time for answers.

"I came to talk to you, I'm leaving and I'm not coming back. I need a favor and I knew you were the only one that would show up, the only one who could do this." Jenna spoke quicker than she was before; Spencer assumed that Paige was going to show up any moment.  
"Why the hell should I do anything for you? You set me up, Jenna. How am I going to explain this?" Spencer shouted, she was starting to get angry at the whole situation.

"You're going to have to just trust me on this, you don't have any other options. I need you to take this letter, give it to Toby for me but not until the date on the envelope. Please make sure he get's it. Don't open it, promise me?" Jenna pulled an envelope out of her pocket, her face was straight, but her eyes were pleading. Spencer hesitantly took it and slid it into her back pocket.

"I promise, now what am I going to do about Paige?" Spencer asked, she glanced down at her phone, it was 12:23.

"Tomorrow evening, Emily needs to be out of Rosewood. Don't go to the lake house, that's too close. Go as far away as possible, head north and make sure you stop in a city by 6 o'clock. Your car is going to break down and you need to stay the night, make sure you stay the night. Be elaborate as to where you are going; make up a reason to skip school. It needs to be fun and you need to be convincing. That's all I can say." Jenna took a step closer to Spencer, her cheeks were flushed and her eye's watering.

"I need answers Jenna, what about Paige?" Spencer pleaded.

Just then the bushes ruffled again, both girls turned to see a black silhouette standing in the shadow. A light flashed, it was the light from Paige's phone, she had taken the photo.

"That's our que to run, goodbye Spencer." Jenna said quickly, than she darted toward the woods in the opposite direction. Spencer's eyes fled back to Paige. Paige now had proof that something shady was going on with Spencer, she was going to look so suspicious and have no valid accuse to get out of this. She needed to get that phone from Paige, but something in her stopped her from walking. Spencer stood blankly for a moment, staring directly at Paige who was staring back, both un-moving.

_Trust Jenna, it's your only option _thought's racing though Spencer's head, she started running towards her car that was parked a block away. Paige followed a few feet back; Spencer turned down a back ally and climbed over a fence, using a dumpster to boost herself over. She sharply turned a corner and made her way into her car. Spencer started the ignition and peeled away as quickly as possible, no sign of Paige anywhere in sight.

* * *

Emily awoke to a knock on her bedroom door. The curtains in her bedroom let in enough sun-rays to make Emily think she slept through her alarm. She quickly hopped out of bed and grabbed her t-shirt off the floor, pulling it over her head, "Just a second!" She yelled as she stumbled across her floor to grab the first pair shorts she could find.

It was a long night for Emily; she tossed and turned for a good two hours trying to get thought's of Spencer out of her mind. Every day, her emotions continued to develop for her friend, pushing her further away from Paige. Feeling defeated, Emily gave into her emotions and spent the rest of her evening fantasizing about what it would be like to be with Spencer. Imaging Spencer's soft touch again her skin and her lips pressed roughly against her neck. Her thoughts were consumed until she was too exhausted to move. She fell asleep in a sweaty pool of nakedness.

"Uhm, you can come in now!" Emily walked over to the side of her bed to grab her phone as the door opened; she pretended to be reading something on the screen but looked over to the door a second later.

Spencer stood on the other side of the door, a huge grin plastered on her face as she walked inside Emily's room and shut the door behind her, "Good morning."

Emily blushed, dropping her phone on her bed, her eye's opened wider, thoughts of last night rushed through her mind and she felt extremely embarrassed about it all. She was extremely surprised to see the cause of her insomnia, standing before her looking incredibly beautiful.

Spencer raised an eye brow at the sight of Emily, they stood still for a brief moment, "You uh, your shirts on backwards," Spencer pointed out, hoping to break the awkward silence that was floating among them. She looked down to see a pair of swimming shorts tugging at Emily's waist.

"Oh. Sorry. Hi." Emily mumbled she bit her lip not knowing what to say. She felt like Spencer could read her thoughts, she felt exposed.

"Did I, interrupt something?" Spencer said as a smiled tugged at the side of Spencer's lips. She figured Emily was probably having a sexy dream before Spencer interrupted her sleep. It would definitely explain her 'pajamas' and her hair. Seeing her like that made Spencer's legs feel weak, she wanted to take Emily and do unspeakable things to her in that bed.

"N-no. Just had to put some clothes on, I thought you were my mom." Emily blushed deeper this time, she didn't want Spencer to have a chance to say anything else about it though, "What are you doing here so early, Spence? It's 6am." Emily pointed out, just noticing how early it was. She should have been irritated for the unplanned wake up call, but there was no way she could be mad at Spencer.

Spencer walked over and sat on the bed beside Emily. Emily's heart started pounding as she looked at Spencer, her lips looked so soft and her flawless skin was glowing from the sun's light. Dark circles under Spencer's eyes made Emily question if everything was alright.

"I convinced your parents to let you join me on a trip to Harvard today. They are having open tours right now and opportunities for full scholarships in a variety or areas, but we have to go during the week before placements fill up. I thought it would be nice if we could spend some alone time together. We can make some fun sightseeing stops on the way, if you want to come?" Spencer said, hoping that Emily would say yes.

Spencer was up all night trying to figure out somewhere she could take Emily that was far away from Rosewood. Harvard was only about 5 hours away, it was the perfect reason. It would be a beneficial reason to skip school, it made since for Pam and Wayne to let Emily go and honestly, Spencer was looking for a College and so was Emily. Spencer looked up at Emily, taking her eyes off the ground for the first time since she sat down. They made eye contact and Emily's stomach sent a familiar ache through her body, she wanted to kiss Spencer, right then and there, but she refrained, "That sounds wonderful, Spence. Let me get dressed and we can go."

Emily stood up, but Spencer didn't budge. It's not like they've never changed in front of each other. Spencer knew it was a terrible idea not to leave the room, but she didn't want to make things feel awkward by leaving just because Emily was changing.

"So what's the plan?" Emily asked as she searched through her dresser for a simple band T-shirt to wear, she slid off the inside-out V-neck and dropped it to the floor.

Spencer stared at her bare back but averted her eyes as Emily turned around to grab her bra off the bed, Spencer cleared her throat, "I was thinking we could get breakfast at Starbucks on our way up, maybe have lunch on campus and do all the stuff at the school, meet some people, get some info and then on our way home we could stop in Queens and do some touristy things." Spencer said rambling a bit, staring out the window until Emily was fully dressed.

"Sounds great, let's go." Emily smiled. She picked up her bag off the ground and slipped her phone into the back pocket of her jeans.

* * *

**A/N: I hope that was unexpected and somewhat confusing. As soon as 16 new reviews hit, I'll post the new chapter. Thanks for reading.**


	5. Secrets Are For Telling

**Apologies in the lack of updating, I ended up working all weekend and haven't had the opportunity to sit down and write. The next chapter will take place where this one leaves off. Thanks all for the reviews, they are much appreciated, I would have updated with or without them, I'd keep writing if even just one person was reading it. I just wanted to see who all out there was actually reading, so thanks. (:**

* * *

"I'll drive," Emily said, grabbing her car keys off the hook near the door. She slid them in her front pocket and turned around to see if Spencer was following. There was a brief silence during the walk downstairs, which struck Emily as odd seeing as Spencer was just Chatty Kathy while up in her room.

Spencer stopped in her tracks to look at Emily, hoping that her facial expression wasn't revealing her thoughts. "No Em, I'll drive. It was my idea, so I should be the one to take us there."

Emily looked at her blankly for a moment. She felt bad that Spencer would be putting the miles on her car and using her gas, especially because she was taking the trip for Emily in the first place, or so she thought. "Spence, really I got it."

Emily turned back around to open the door, but as she cracked it Spencer put her hand on it and gently pushed it shut. Emily turned back to face her friend, she crossed her arms, ready to put up a fight. Spencer grinned, knowing that Emily was going to insist on driving because she was just too polite.

They stood, a few feet apart, just staring at each other, waiting for the other to say something. Finally, Spencer took the opportunity to try to intimidate Emily as a form of persuasion. She leaned closer to her, increasing Emily's heart rate, and raised her eye brows narrowing her eye's slightly. She was trying to give her best 'future lawyer' look, "Keys please, Ms. Fields." Spencer said sternly.

Emily hesitated, but then dropped them on the table near the door, she felt weak, but for different reasons that Spencer intended, "Fine, you drive. But I'm buying you dinner to make up for it." Emily said, opening the door and motioning for Spencer to go out it.

Walking out the door, Spencer wore a smug grin, "You are too easy."

"Maybe I am." Emily whispered seductively as she walked around Spencer to the passenger door. The brunette stopped in her tracks for the second time this morning and looked questioningly at Emily but Emily missed the look on Spencer's face. Spencer tugged the bottom of her button down shirt and slid her hands down the center to make sure she didn't miss any buttons, she suddenly felt nervous about being alone with Emily.

* * *

"So they left to tour a campus and didn't even invite us? Some friends they are." Hannah said bitterly.

Aria and Hannah were sitting outside in the commons area of Rosewood Day; they had about an hour before classes started. They had planned on meeting up early to discuss their next move as far as Un-hooding Red Coat went. Last night had been cut short, due to Mrs. Hastings early arrival home. And it's not like the girls could rifle through the Hastings's stuff with her there. So they had all gone home, planning to meet up early at school.

Aria received a text message from Spencer earlier that morning, explaining the whole college tour thing and that she and Emily wouldn't be at school today.  
"I think you know why Spence didn't tell you." Aria smiled, taking a sip of her coffee.

Spencer would have never heard the end of it, Hannah would have been texting her every few minutes, asking how it was and encouraging Spencer to make a move. It was just yesterday afternoon that Spencer _basically _admitted that she had feelings for Emily. Okay, well not Emily, but the fact that she admitted she was gay was close enough and Hannah had been making very unsubtle hints about things since then. Even before Spencer admitted things, Hannah would make comments about how adorable Emily and Spencer would be together and things like that.

Aria didn't think that Spencer had feelings for Emily, but Hannah had constantly been harassing her about it. It had been going on for the past few months, but more so over the past weekend than ever.

"I guess. But it's so much fun to tease her, she gets all uncomfortable and embarrassed. How often do you see Spencer embarrassed? I mean really, oh and you see the way she looks at Emily. She's practically eye fucking her 24/7, and Emily's got it just as bad." Hannah laughs and Aria can't help but giggle,

"Hannah, I don't know about that. Spencer and Toby seem happy together, I think you are just misreading things."

"Are you blind, woman?"

"All's I'm saying is that maybe things aren't always as they seem."

"Exactly, Spencer is obviously not happy with Toby, even though she seems happy. And she's obviously in love with Emily and that's exactly how it seems." Hannah shot Aria an amused look, Hannah was right, she probably shouldn't have been telling Aria, but hey there shouldn't be secrets between them anyway. Spencer would understand, she may kill Hannah, but she'd understand.

"I don't know Han. I mean, I could see if Emily had feelings for Spencer, but Em's gay… Does this have to do with the body shots on Friday night or is there something you know that I don't?" Aria asked, feeling out of the loop. She hadn't really been paying much attention to anyone else lately. Aria and Emily talked on the porch last Saturday, but besides that, Aria's been in her own head dealing with her own shit.

"Spencer may have told me that she has feelings for Emily."

"She told you that, just out of the blue? Why?" Aria was upset now and it was clear in her tone. She wondered why Spencer would trust Hannah with that and not her. With Hannah's big mouth, Aria was surprised that Emily didn't already know.

"Not exactly, okay, she didn't say that she likes Em, but she did say that she's gay. I forced it out of her, when I was questioning her about where she was on Sunday." Hannah failed to mention to Aria about what Paige had said to her that evening. She knew that Emily told Aria about her fight with Paige, but wasn't exactly sure what all Emily said. Hannah was too consumed with finding out where Spencer was that she didn't even think on filling Aria and Emily in on what everything Paige said to her.

"Where was she? Where was I? I obviously know that Paige thinks Spencer is A, but I didn't really catch anything other than that."

"It's a long story, that's really not important right now. Anyway, Spencer was at a strip club, she wanted to see if sexy, half naked woman would turn her on and I don't really blame her. So now it's only a matter of time before dumps Toby for Em." Hannah was excited, she often didn't make since when she was excited, but Aria decided not to push for details. Hannah wanted to see her friends get together, more than anything. The past few years have been a disaster, they deserved some sort of happiness. More now, than ever, especially if A was going to continue to torture them.

"Are you forgetting about Paige and Emily? And seeing as Paige thinks Spencer is A, I don't think things are going to go will from there… But it would be nice to see Emily and Spencer together, they would be good for each other," Aria said, thinking about the possibilities of that, then she remember the main reason that she and Hannah were at school so early, "Did you talk to Caleb about the phone that he and Paige were tracing?"

"He went camping with his dad and they haven't made it back yet." Hannah said, not wanting to think about any of that right now. She didn't want to think about A, or her 'family' issues or anything along those lines right now. She wanted to enjoy the day, for what it was and catch up with Aria about normal things. Because honestly, Hannah knew that she and Aria wouldn't make much progress on their own, so why bother.

"Hopefully he can help us." Aria stated, she was observing Hannah's facial expressions, trying to understand what her friend could be thinking.

Hannah stood up and slung her purse onto her shoulder and smiled at Aria, "Let's skip school today, we could go to the mall or see a movie or something." Aria didn't even have to think about that, "I'm in. It's been a while since you and I have spent time together actually doing something fun."

* * *

Emily and Spencer spent the first hour of their drive to Harvard, talking about school and how classes were going. Basically just light conversation. Emily missed spending alone time with Spencer, it was so easy to carry a conversation with her. There was never a lull or awkward silence between them, it was comfortable, and Spencer was comfortable. This was the first time they had the chance to be alone in over two months and they had way too much to catch up on.

The entire time they were talking, Emily was waiting for the right moment to bring up the conversation they had the previous morning at school. Spencer seemed like she was going to tell Emily something important, she seemed kind of troubled. Plus Spencer wanted to explain why she was acting so weird before. Emily just wasn't sure if it would be wise to bring it up, especially since they had the whole day ahead of them.

As they pulled up to the Starbucks drive through window to pay for their drinks, Emily felt the need to bring it up, "Umm, Spence. Yesterday morning, when we were by the pool, you were going to tell me something, it seemed important. And we never had the chance to talk, but I'm curious…" Emily said as she took the iced beverage from Spencer's hand and placed it in the cup holder. Their fingers barely brushed and it completely distracted Spencer's thoughts.

Spencer turned back to the window to grab her 24 oz black coffee from the barista and thanked her for the beverage. Emily eyed Spencer's drink, hoping all that caffeine wouldn't give Spencer a heart attack.

As Spencer was pulling out of the drive through, she glanced over at Emily, "Sorry, Em, what did you say?"

"What was going on with you? You were going to tell me yesterday, but we didn't get the chance to talk again." Emily changed the wording, hoping to sound more confident. She wasn't sure why, but she felt nervous about bringing up the topic.

Spencer winced at the question; she knew that Emily was going to ask sooner or later. Yesterday, Spencer was ready to talk about things, but now she wasn't. She debated telling Emily everything that she planned on the previous day. But had to start with something, she cleared her throat, hoping to get through this conversation without breaking down. "Honestly, I was really depressed. After U-Penn rejected me, I started to freak out about the future, for the first time in my life I felt like everything I have ever done was pointless. All the hours studying, working hard to be _perfect_, academically speaking, it all seemed like a waste of time. I felt like I had no future. And I was scared… I started thinking about the time I spent in Radly. It was easy there, there was no responsibility, no sense of reality and it was peaceful in a way. I felt safe there and for the first time in my life, I actually felt normal, like it's was where I belong. That's a terrifying thought, Em, to feel normal in a crazy house." Spencer paused, she took a sip of her coffee hoping to relieve her dried out throat. She rested her hand on top of the coffee cup and glanced over at Emily, who was staring intently at Spencer and silently nodding for her to continue. Emily's eyes locked on the brunettes profile as she turned back to face the road. Spencer continued her story, "I was actually debating running away. I seriously considered creating a new identity and moving to Seattle."

"Why Seattle?" Emily asked, hoping not to make Spencer feel uncomfortable about sharing. She knew that depression was a hard topic to discuss, so she tried to make it a bit lighter.

"It's the Coffee capital of like, the entire world, why else?" Spencer chuckled and Emily giggled at her friend, "I like the rain, it's a crowded city and I feel like I could blend in there. Maybe go to the University of Washington, have the opportunity to reinvent myself and be someone other than Spencer Hastings. But then I realized that I couldn't just disappear. I would be leaving behind the one thing I could never get back, or ever replace."

"Toby?" Emily guessed, she didn't even try to hide her disappointment.

"No. You…" Spencer trailed off, but realized how that must have sounded, "And Aria and Hannah. You three are the reason I couldn't leave, and probably the reason I'm alive right now." Tears silently started flowing down Spencer's face, for someone who hated crying; two times in front of two different people in two days, was a new record for her.

"I think a world without Spencer Hastings in it would be a terrible place and I don't think I could live without you in my life, Spence," Emily rested her hand on top of Spencer's, hoping to comfort her, "When we weren't talking, I felt like I was missing a part of myself. If that makes any sense? It gave me a chance to grow closer with Hannah and Aria, but they aren't you and could never fill the part of my life that you do..."

Emily felt extremely guilty. When Spencer started acting strange, Emily didn't think too much of it until the point where they barely spoke. She was concerned for her friend and figured she just needed some alone time, but deep inside Emily new something was wrong. She knew that she should have pushed Spencer to talk to her or to at least let her know that she cared. But Emily was so focused on other things that fighting to talk to Spencer would have just created another issue.

The way Emily felt for Spencer was indescribable. She had always loved Spencer, like the sister she never had, but something in the back of Emily's mind had always nagged at her, telling her that she wanted more from Spencer than a friendship. The problem was that Emily was terrified to even acknowledge the idea of liking Spencer in a romantic way. Spencer was her _straight_, best friend. But after their kiss Saturday evening, Emily was having issues keeping her thoughts from straying to wanting Spencer.

Emily's comment made Spencer cry even harder, she felt like she should have pulled over to let Emily drive, but she liked being able to focus on the road. It kept her thoughts from straying too far.

"I would hug you if I weren't driving." Spencer smiled, moving her hand from under Emily's to intertwine their fingers together. Emily's breath hitched in her throat, she didn't like how a small amount of contact was making her feel. She needed a distraction, "Is that all that was going on, Spence?"

"Basically, it was just massive depression about the future…" Spencer bit her lip, her heart decided that it wanted to put some input in the conversation despite her mind screaming no, "Well, I've also been questioning some things…"

"Like what?"

"My relationship with Toby."

"Did something happen?"

"No, Toby's great. It's just…" Spencer glanced down at their hands, feeling both wonderful and terrified at the same time. Emily squeezed Spencer's hand gently, urging her to continue talking. Spencer looked back up at the road, contemplating if she should tell Emily everything she told Hannah. She felt like opening up about the depression thing was enough, but she couldn't think of any other reason to tell Emily other than the truth.

"I'm the problem. I love him, but I'm not attracted to him in a sexual way. I thought that maybe having sex would change that but it's just made things harder."

"What do you mean, Spence?"

"I don't know. I uh, I've never been sexually attracted to a guy before." Spencer clinched her jaw shut. Feeling like a moron. She had run what she wanted to say through her mind plenty of times yesterday, but as she spoke nothing came out the way she planned.

"What about a woman?"

Blood flushed to Spencer's cheeks, she never thought it would be so hard to talk about this. She figured that after telling Hannah, it may be easier to talk to other people, but it wasn't, or maybe it was just Emily who was hard to talk to, maybe it was just being with Emily that tied her tongue in knots and cleared her mind of making sense. The blush basically answered Emily's question, but she was hoping for a response from Spencer. "Yeah," Spencer said in a whisper, just loud enough for Emily to hear. A huge grin spread across Emily's face, she looked over at Spencer who seemed extremely focused on the road.

"That's awesome, Spence. Honestly, I had this feeling that you might be gay, I just didn't want to make you question it." Emily said in a semi-sympathetic tone.

Spencer couldn't help but smile at that, Emily was the reason she questioned it. The sexy dreams were a fairly new occurrence, but the thoughts of Emily, of wanting Emily, have been floating around for a good year now. She loved her, as a best friend would, but there was more to it than that. Feelings were complicated and that's why she pushed them aside for the longest time. But as they were unfolding, Spencer found her self confused as hell.

"I guess I have been subconsciously blocking it out, I wanted to love Toby, to have the perfect relationship that everyone thought we have, but it's just not the way it should be." Spencer said, feeling a bit more open now that Emily knew. Their hands were still intertwined so Spencer took that as a good sign, that things between them wouldn't be awkward.

"I know exactly what you mean. So… is there a girl you like then? Because I'm sure she's totally into you, Spence, you are pretty amazing." Emily stated, in a playful, somewhat flirtatious tone. She pressed her lips together in a straight line, hoping she didn't sound like she was flirting, it was just a comment, it didn't mean too much.

Spencer smiled at Emily's question, _yeah there is someone, but it's you…_Spencer thought, feeling annoyed that she couldn't say that out loud. There was way too much at steak to say anything, especially because they were both in relationships. And Emily loved Paige; there was no way that she would dump her for Spencer…was there? Would it ruin their friendship if Emily knew how Spencer was feeling? There were more questions where that came from, but Emily interrupted Spencer's thoughts.

"Spencer?"

"Sorry, I was wondering if we are going in the right direction. Umm no, no one at the moment," Spencer lied, she suddenly felt really good about telling Emily everything that she did, "Em, do you maybe want to blow of the college thing and spend the day in New York instead?"

Emily gasped dramatically, "Spencer Hastings wants to blow off academics in exchange for something fun? Who are you and what have you done with my best friend?" Emily started laughing; she loved the idea of spending the day with Spencer in New York. She wasn't particularly thrilled about the whole college walk through thing, the only reason Emily went was to have the opportunity to have Spencer all to herself for the day.

"Funny, Em. Do you want to? I know of a cute little Italian Restaurant in central park where we could get dinner, I could make reservations for 5:30 and we could spend the day doing whatever you want."

"I would love that."

* * *

**Again, the next chapter will be a continuation of Spencer and Emily's alone time. I'll probably post it tomorrow, because that's all the writing I can do this evening. Working three 17 hour shifts, kinda kicked my ass weekend as well as drained my thoughts that should be in my mind. **


	6. City Lights and Romance

**Thanks for the reviews, you guys are all wonderful. It really means a lot to hear your thoughts! I'm also glad that some of you are enjoying having Hannah and Aria in the story, I plan to keep them because I want to stick to the story line I have in mind, but I promise their will be Spemily. I personally think it's more satisfying to have to overcome obstacles and have a plot that involves a lot of different things, rather than just give into one specific relationship and focus on that and I tend to write how I like to read if that makes any sense? Idk. Thanks though, hope you all enjoy the chapter (:**

* * *

The street light's glow illuminated the city releasing a somewhat enchanted vibe to the inhabitants. Spencer parked her car in the parking garage a few blocks away from the restaurant, it wasn't exactly the closest parking spot, but it gave them the opportunity to walk by The Washington Square Hotel, where Spencer had planned to stay for the night.

As Emily walked down the sidewalk beside Spencer, their hands would brush every few steps. Emily smiled at the small friction between them; she wondered what Spencer was thinking. The entire day had been perfect, at least for Emily, every aspect about it. From the drive from Rosewood, to looking at shops and walking throughout parks and seeing monuments, to the few simple conversations they had on the drive to the restaurant.

At certain moments, Spencer would get really quiet, like she was contemplating something. Her facial expression unmoving and a hint of nervousness would show in her actions. Emily wondered what the reasons were behind that, if maybe Spencer was acting this way because she could return the feelings that Emily had been harvesting. But at the same time, Emily wondered if maybe she was over thinking things, if maybe that's how things had always been and she just wasn't as observant beforehand. Maybe Spencer was just being Spencer and Emily was thinking way too much into it because she now knew that Spencer was, well, gay.

Spencer smiled once the restaurant was in view, it looked like a cute café from the outside, but she knew very well that it wasn't. She held the door for Emily as she walked inside. Emily's eyes widened as they took a few steps in the restaurant, it wasn't what she was expecting.

Dim lights shone down upon the hostess table and across the dark yellow paint across the walls. It was fancy and very Italian, nothing like the _café _that Emily pictured. A tall, woman came out from behind swinging doors and looked at Emily, "Buonasera, welcome to Babbo's Ristorante," She stopped speaking as she made eye contact with Spencer, then a huge grin spread across her face, "Signorina Hastings, your table is right this way."

Emily observed the woman as she lead them to the table; she was pretty, very pretty actually. Her long blond hair was tied up into a messy bun, she was tall, her long tan legs were accentuated by the short black dress she was wearing and her body looked fantastic in it. Instead of feeling attracted to the extremely gorgeous woman, Emily felt a ping of jealousy.

As they walked through the dining room, Emily looked around at the restaurant; it was beautiful and extremely authentic and felt as if they were actually in Italy. They walked out of the overly crowded dining area around a corner into a back room with a single table placed in the middle the floor. It was a little round table, with a single candle lit in the center and two wine glasses beside the square, white plates.

Spencer and Emily sat down and the woman looked over at Spencer again, "è questa la data? Lei è bella."

Spencer smiled at the question and a blush spread lightly across her cheeks, "Se solo fosse così, ma no. Lei è la mia migliore amica. Thank you for the reservations on such short notice."

"Anything for a Hastings…Is there anything I can get for you ladies to drink?"

"How about two glasses of Chianti?" Spencer flashed an 'See I'm a Hastings, I can do whatever the hell I want smile' at the Emily. The waitress smiled and left without another word, she also never looked away from Spencer the entire time they were at the table, which was slightly frustrating to Emily.

"She likes you Spence." Emily said trying to sound as uninterested as possible. Spencer chuckled at the thought, her eyes still on the menu, "Marci? She's just being nice, she's a family friend."

"No, Spence, she definitely likes you. You should ask her out." Emily said. Spencer made eye contact with Emily and after a brief moment of silence responded, "She's not my type."

"Tall, blond, extremely sexy and Italian isn't your type?"

"No, Em. Maybe _you_ should ask her out." Spencer mimicked Emily in a sense.

"Fine, maybe I will, since you are too chicke-" Emily stopped for a second, her mind flashing to Paige for the first time since yesterday, they were still together. Which sent an ache into Emily's chest, but not because she felt guilty about their conversation or anything, the reason being just that, she was still with Paige.

Spencer noticed the look on Emily's face and knew exactly what she was thinking, "If you aren't happy with Paige than maybe you should break up with her." Spencer said bluntly, she felt like her words were a bit harsher than intended, but she had to put it out there.

Emily wasn't happy with Paige anymore. The constant pressure to make life altering decisions to go with Paige to college, the nagging about the injury, the nagging about 'Spencer being A', there was no passion left in their relationship and nothing to fight for. Emily felt bad about it all, because it wasn't that long ago that she told Paige that she loved her, but mentally it felt like things have been over for months.

Emily looked angry and Spencer immediately regretted saying it, "I'm sorry, Em, that was out of line. I don't want you mad at me again; I don't think I could handle it."

"You are right though. Our relationship has been over for a while, I just, I don't want to go through the whole break up thing. You know how Paige can be…" Emily trailed off, unsure of what else to say on the topic. She didn't really know what to think or even why she was still with Paige, the past two weeks were constant fighting and it was to the point where she didn't even know why she liked her to begin with.

"Sometimes letting someone go is the best thing you can do for them as well as the best thing you can do for yourself. Emily, you need a woman who will treat you right. You need someone who will take care of you and will show you respect, someone that will love you but also confront you when you are wrong and comfort you when you're hurting. You deserve to be shown undivided attention, whoever you are with should want to do anything for you and no offence, but that's not Paige. Paige doesn't deserve you." Spencer was staring intently into Emily's eyes, but looked away as Marci walked back in with their wine, both girls fell silent. The waitress looked back and forth between them before speaking, "Are you ladies ready to order?"

Emily blushed, picking up the menu off of the table, "I haven't actually looked at the menu yet."

Marci looked at Emily for the first time since she noticed Spencer, "Take your time, the night is still young." She poured their wine and left but not before winking at Spencer on the way out.

Spencer watched Emily as she looked over the menu; the brunette already knew what she wanted and it was the girl sitting directly across her. Emily blushed again, feeling Spencer's gaze on her and Spencer looked away, feeling like Emily could read her mind.

"Thank you." Emily said to Spencer bringing her eyes back to Emily's.

"For what?"

"For everything. Taking me out of Rosewood for the day, following me around town as I took photos of everything_, _taking me to this beautiful restaurant, which by the way, is in no way a café. And just for being here, telling me that I can do better than Paige. Spence, you are truly the best friend anyone could ever ask for." Emily said quickly, trying to get the words out before they disappeared.

Spencer's eye's welled with tears, but she looked away so she wouldn't start crying and cleared her throat, "Emily, I would do anything for you." She wanted to say more, but didn't want to give away the words that were buzzing behind her lips; her feelings couldn't come out, not now.

Marci walked back in the room, carrying a plate of bread. Emily looked up at her and smiled as Spencer buried her face back into the menu. "Have you decided on a dish?" She asked Emily and then turned her gaze over to Spencer, who was still in the process of trying not to cry.

It was so unlike Spencer to get emotional, especially over some simple words. She tended to keep things bottled up inside, kind of like a guy would, and express them in different ways. It wasn't like she was unemotional or insensitive, it was just that the simplicity of Emily expressing that she cared for her as a friend shouldn't have affected her the way it did.

"I'll have the Spaghetti con le Lumache." Spencer said, clearing her throat. She decided that she was ready to express her feelings for Emily tonight, not right now of course, but later, once the timing felt right. Tonight was the perfect opportunity. She smiled to herself, feeling high off of her emotions. The thought of Toby was far from Spencer's mind.

* * *

"Come on, Aria. He's hot, do something about it." Hannah said, glancing at Aria from the side of her chair. They were in the process of getting pedicures, the entire day was a nice chance for either girl to relax in months and it had been wonderful so far.

Aria was relaxing in the massage chair, the vibration settings were starting to make her lower back numb, it was a good feeling though, "I don't know. He's a great guy, but I guess I'm not really over Ezra. After everything that we went through, all the obstacles we overcame, I just wish we would have kept fighting for our relationship. I still love him."

It had been four months since Aria and Ezra had 'officially' stopped seeing each other, things had been hard for the both of them. But she did it for Ezra, to protect him, to give him a life and to keep A the hell away from him. She gave up the one thing in her life that was steady, something real but she knew that Ezra would have done the same if he were in her situation.

"You should probably make up your mind, before it's too late. They aren't going to wait around forever. Love is only…it's... okay, I lost the quote. I had a quote in mind from that book we read last month for English the one with the castle thingy on the front. Anyways, it's like, it's a rare thing okay." Hannah said, rambling on as she flipped through the pages of last month's People magazine.

Aria giggled, feeling the need to make the conversation lighter than where it was heading, "Thanks Hannah, how are things with you and Caleb?"

"Good, oh god they are _good_. He's been gone for a week, but we had a damn good night before he left." Hannah said, wondering if Aria was going to make a snarky comment on how with Hannah, everything is always about sex one way or another.

"God I miss sex." Aria said in a whisper, so that the other ladies in the salon wouldn't hear. It was true, she really did miss it.

"That's exactly why you should do something about Jake, again, he's hot," Hannah put down the magazine she was reading and shifted her upper body so she could make eye contact with Aria, "What do you have to lose?"

"He did mention going on a double date with his cousin and Mike."

"How could he take you home with your little brother there?"

"Great, now I feel like I'm only going to be using Jake."

"He's a guy, Aria, you have needs… I _really_ don't think he'll mind," Hannah smiled as she stood to put her shoes back on.

Aria felt good about skipping school, she and Hannah needed this. Not necessarily the day off school, but a day to spend time together, alone, without thought's of the psycho stalker that's ruining their lives. It was nice to actually be able to relax and Aria was hoping to take advantage of that.

"I'll call Jake and see if he wants to do something tonight." Aria pulled out her cell phone and realized that she had missed 9 calls in the past 10 minutes. She quickly opened up the missed call log to see who needed to get a hold of her so badly.

* * *

"Dinner was delicious." Emily smiled at Marci as she sat the check on the table. Spencer had talked Emily into getting the Asparagus Ravioli, which didn't sound too good at first, but by the time dinner was over Emily was convinced that they could cover a stick of Styrofoam with their sauce and it would be heavenly.

"I'm glad you enjoyed it," Marci looked over at Spencer, the same grin appeared, the 'I want to take you home with me' type grin, but she continued to act professional, "More wine, Ms. Hastings?"

"No thank you, I actually have to drive home tonight." Spencer smiled and reached for the check but Emily grabbed the other side quickly.

"I'll get dinner, Spence." Emily said, attempting to gently tug it from Spencer grasp. Spencer wasn't planning on letting go. Marci decided that it might be a good time to leave the room, she didn't want to get involved in whatever was about to take place.

"Don't worry about it, it's on me. I'm the one who chose the restaurant to begin with."

"Remember when we left this morning? I said I'm buying dinner, so I am." Emily tugged again, hoping Spencer would give in.

"Why won't you just let me handle it, Em? I really don't mind."

"Because if you buy dinner than this is… this is a date then." Emily said, hoping that was enough to make Spencer let go, it was the first thing Emily could think of that my get under Spencer's skin.

"Why the hell would that, make this a date? The way I see it, is that I chose this semi-pricey restaurant, I should get the bill."

"Spence, we are in the private room of probably the nicest restaurant in town, if I let you get dinner than I would feel extremely guilty. Especially because you drove and bought breakfast and insisted on coffee earlier, I do have money you know." Emily tried reasoning; she could have just let it go like she did this morning, but seeing Spencer getting worked up was extremely attractive for some odd reason.

"Well, you buying dinner would be equally as date-esk."

"Fine, it's a date than. Give me the check." Emily held out her hand, trying to glare at Spencer, but the smile on her face was making it hard. Spencer handed it over, wondering why it was so important to Emily to pay for dinner.

Marci walked back into the room with a box for Emily's Ravioli, as she scooped it into the box, she looked at Emily, "You know, you two would make a very cute couple."

"Thanks, this is a date after all." Spencer winked at Emily, who tried not to smile.

"Well, Ms. Hastings, you are an expensive date." Emily said, but gave into the smile. She was joking, of course. She handed Marci the check and got a funny look from Spencer.

Spencer looked up at Marci, "She's very stubborn, you know."

"If anyone's stubborn, it's Spencer." Emily quickly cut in before Marci could respond. Marci just stood there smiling; the tension that filled the room was almost unbearable, even a blind man would be able to see how much those two wanted each other. Marci sneaked away, not wanting to interrupt the rest of there flirtatious argument.

"You're the one buying dinner; I think you are more stubborn."

"I disagree with you on that, I think the only reason you let me win is so that you could use reverse psychology and get me to want to buy you dinner."

"Maybe I wanted you to think that I was using reverse psychology to try to get you to by dinner, but in actuality I really did want to buy dinner but you are so incredibly stubborn that you overrode everything I was attempting to do, which was indeed to pay for dinner." Spencer said matter-o-factly. Emily stared at her blankly trying to process what she was saying, she was officially lost in the conversation. Spencer continued talking, "And for the record, if I knew you were going to insist so much to pay, I would have chose somewhere cheaper."

Marci walked back in and sat the little black check thing on the table in front of Emily, "Thanks for coming in ladies, are you positive you are okay to drive? There is a hotel right around the corner." Marci said, looking over at Spencer.

"I only had a glass, I'm positive that I'll be fine."

"What about last weekend, you "only had a glass" then too," Emily was just teasing, but Spencer glared at her than looked back to Marci, "I'm fine, we should probably get going though. Thank you for the lovely dinner."

"No, thank you Ms. Hastings, it's always wonderful to see you. You two have a nice evening." Marci said, with that she left.

"She so wants you." Emily smiled, she was enjoying picking on Spencer, it felt so nice to have a light evening.

Spencer ignored Emily's comment, her mind still on the whole 'wine thing', "I swear that I only had a glass of wine at the Lake House. But we aren't talking about that now. Do you want desert? I know of a great Ice Cream shop in Philly." Spencer said, trying to keep up the 'going home' act, even though she clearly knew they weren't leaving town tonight.

"I am so full, Spence. But you know, that could change by the time we get there, something sweet does sound nice, but I'm not sure about ice cream." Emily said.

Spencer raised her eyebrows, thinking way too far into what Emily said. _She didn't mean it the way I'm thinking she meant it, it was innocent… nothing more going on. The playful bantering at dinner didn't mean anything more either. Just two friends having fun and arguing… nothing more, this is normal. It's just been way to long since Em and I have spent time together, but this is normal…_

They stood up and left the restaurant. Thought's buzzing through Spencer's mind. Once they arrived back to Spencer's car. She thought about how exactly to fake that her car was broken down and wouldn't start.

Emily opened the passenger door and sat the left-over's on Spencer's car floor and then buckled her seat belt. Spencer climbed in and buckled up; she put the key in the ignition and slowly twisted the handle.

* * *

"Hello?" Aria said into the phone, the number who she missed the calls from was unknown, so Hannah urged her to call it back.

"Aria? Is everything ok? You weren't answering and Emily's not answering and I'm extremely worried. Where are you? Is Emily with you?" Paige spoke quickly into the telephone.

"Slow down. What's wrong?" Aria turned her phone on speaker so Hannah could hear the conversation. They were sitting outside the coffee shop by the salon by the time Aria decided to call the number back.

"Last night I saw Spencer and A, they were meeting in the park and I got a photo. But I can't find my phone anywhere and I'm worried about Emily, she's not answering and I don't know what to do."

"What? Emily is wit-" Hannah cut Aria off and put her hand over the phone. Aria looked puzzled and Hannah spoke in a whisper, "Don't tell her, I don't know what's going on, but I know that Spencer's not A and Emily's safe with her. Make up something, and ask what happened."

"What happened last night? Why do you think you saw Spencer?" Aria asked into the phone, her heart rate increasing from Paige's stress that was seeping through the phone.

"I don't_ think_ I did, I _know_ I did. I have proof, but I really can't find my phone. I caught Spencer with A and she ran, I chased after her, but last thing I remember is her jumping a fence. My memory from there is gone, I woke up in my bed like 20 minutes ago, I think they drugged me and took my phone. Have you seen Emily?" Paige was hysterical, she sounded like a crazy person.

"Calm down. Emily's with us, so is Spencer, so stop worrying. I'm the only one with a phone; we've been having a… spa day."

"You are with Spencer!? Aria she's A!"

"Spencer was with me last night, all night, we stayed up late and I didn't end up sleeping. It had to have been someone else."

"I swear to god that it was her!" Paige yelled.

Hannah grabbed the phone from Aria and hit end to the call and sat it back down on the table, "Nice cover."

Hannah was worried about the situation, more than she was letting on. She was a bit concerned about Paige and what she saw. Spencer wasn't A, but that doesn't mean that Paige didn't see Spencer…and it didn't mean that Spencer wasn't keeping secrets.

Aria studied Hannah's face as they sat in silence; she felt like she knew what her friend was thinking, "Do you think Spencer knows something that we don't?"

"I'm going to be pissed if she's been going off on her own to try and figure things out. She knows how dangerous this is, Spencer is so stupid sometimes. Isn't she supposed to be the smart one?"

"But Han, if it had to do with…Wilden or your mom, Spencer would have kept it from us, or at least you. She's worried about you. We need to figure out the truth. Maybe she found the phone last night?" Aria was piecing things together the best she could, it wasn't unusual for Spencer to get ahead of herself and make irrational, stupid decisions. Aria continued speaking, "Should we call Spence?"

"No. I think we should go to the Hastings though, maybe look around her room?"

"You can't be serious," Aria said, but the look on Hannah's face answered her question, "Hannah, you want to break into Spencer's house and search her room?"

"It will be easier than getting answers from her right now, what if she is hiding something in there? I don't think she would have taken the phone with her, A could easily track it. And besides, you know that no one is home right now." Hannah was serious. But her main reasons for not wanting to call Spencer were kind of selfish; it wasn't because she didn't think that Spencer wouldn't answer the questions. It was because Emily and Spencer were alone and being alone gave them the opportunity to express their feelings for each other. Hannah was determined to get them together, no matter what. She felt like it was something that she needed to do. Why? Who knows, she didn't even know, she just needed to do it. And beisdes, breaking into the Hasting's and sneaking around could be kind of fun.

* * *

**Soo, I wanted to keep going so I wouldn't leave you hanging with questions and such, but I also didn't want to make the wait even longer for a chapter (I only have like 30 minutes a day, at most to write, as I'll be working 50+ hours a week until September, but keep in mind, my free time is spent writing) or to have one really, really long chapter. I hope you all enjoyed it though; I would love to hear some thoughts on it, or even suggestions. **

**Also keep in mind that Spencer is the only one who saw Jenna that night, Paige doesn't know it was Jenna nor does anyone else. Just giving possible hints for what's to come. (:**


	7. Lust is Also a 4 Letter Word

**Keep in mind that this is rated M for a reason. Enjoy. (:**

* * *

Spencer's car started to make a clicking noise as she tried to ignite the ignition, it sounded like the battery was dead. She shut it off and tried once more, but the second time, nothing happened, no noise, the key just moved to the side as if there was nothing under the hood of her car.

"Shit." Spencer mumbled, opening her car door and popping the hood. Convincing, that's what she was going for, but it was a very real type of convincing, she wasn't actually expecting her car to break down. When Jenna was giving the instructions, Spencer just assumed she was supposed to fake her car trouble and have it up and running just fine the next day. She looked around the parking garage, a chill shot down her spine. _A was here_.

Emily opened her door and walk around to the hood, "Spence, what's wrong?"

"I thought it might be the battery. But I-I'm not sure what's wrong." Spencer looked around the garage again and Emily's eyes followed. Spencer seemed jumpy and it made Emily feel uneasy. She closed the hood and looked over at Emily, "Let's get back in the car; we should probably call your parents."

Spencer pulled her phone out for the first time in about 9 hours; she had missed a call from Aria and 6 calls from Paige. She deleted them from the call log and erased a few new texts without even reading them. Paige was probably on the rampage after last night, Spencer had no idea what happened after she sped away in her car. All she knew was that Paige was the least of her worries.

Emily rifled through her purse looking for her cell phone. She couldn't find it anywhere; it wasn't in her coat pockets or on the floor of Spencer's car. She started to panic, fearing that it got left somewhere, "Could you call my phone?"

Concern plagued Spencer's face, if she had missed calls from Paige, Emily must have too. That was something that she hadn't even thought about beforehand. She felt so stupid for not thinking things through, she was so concerned with every other detail that she forgot the one thing that could blow everything. Spencer hit the dial button, hoping not to hear Emily's phone ring. It went straight to voicemail. Spencer looked over at Emily feeling somewhat relived, "Wherever it is, it's off."

Right after Spencer spoke; a new text message appeared on her screen. It was from Emily's cell phone,

**I got your back, bitch.**

**-A**

Spencer's eyes widened and she immediately deleted it, before Emily had a chance to ask who it was from. Her heart pounding, _A's here and she's helping me? Shit. I am so screwed. _Spencer handed Emily her cell phone, "Why don't you call your parents, let them know what's going on. I'm going to take a look under the hood again." She quickly got out before Emily could say anything.

After about 10 minutes of pacing in front of her car, Spencer slammed the hood shut. _Why the hell did A all of a sudden want to help her?_ The passenger door finally opened and Emily slid out of the car, "Why don't we stay the night up here, Spence, we could figure out the car thing in the morning."

Emily's mom suggested they find a hotel before it gets too dark outside. Pam didn't exactly feel comfortable with them staying the night in New York alone, but she felt safer from the fact that Emily was with Spencer. She trusted Spencer, if it was Aria or Hannah or any one else, she probably would have insisted on driving to New York to pick the girls up. But there was something about Spencer's character that Pam found comforting; it felt as if she would do anything for Emily.

"That sounds good. Marci mention a hotel near the restaurant; let's see if they have any rooms available." The panic had left Spencer voice.

Despite her broken car and A lurking somewhere in the shadows, Spencer felt a bit of relief from the fact that things were still going according to plan. They were going to stay the night and that's what mattered. She would deal with tomorrow once it came, until then she was going to enjoy an evening with Emily all to herself.

* * *

"We shouldn't be doing this…" Aria said as Hannah pulled the key to the Hastings' back door from its hiding place. And quickly unlocked the door, she slid the key into her pocket as they walked inside. Hannah was convinced that they might find something inside, the plan was to search Spencer's room to see if she found the phone that was supposedly in the house and if it wasn't in there, they would search the rest off the house picking up where they left off Sunday night.

"Relax, if Spencer and Emily were here, we would probably still be looking for that phone anyway. And if Spencer is hiding something, we have the right to know." Hannah said in a somewhat hushed tone.

Aria looked around the dark kitchen, guilt washing over her, "Maybe we should just trust Spencer she's never given us a reason not too."

"But she's kept secrets before to 'protect' us, we're in this together," Hannah said as they were walking up the stairs. She opened Spencer's door and flipped on the light, the room was a mess, clothes were scattered all over the floor and a couple of the dresser drawers were pulled out. It was very unlike Spencer to have a messy room, Hannah scowled at the sight, "Fuck, A must have beat us to it."

"Language, woman." Aria said scolding her and then smiling at the familiar sight of Spencer's messy room, "I don't think A's been here, Han, I think Spencer couldn't decide what to wear today for her _date_ with Emily."

After 20 minutes of searching through Spencer's room, opening every drawer and rifling through papers and pant pockets, Aria and Hannah gave up. Aria laid down on Spencer's bed in defeat, "That was a waste of time."

"Not a complete waste. We now know that Spence has some really cute shoes, she's interested in strap on sex and enjoys playboy," Hannah laughed as she sat down in the chair across the room. Aria couldn't help but chuckle at that, they were definitely interesting items to find in one of the boots in Spencer's closet.

"I'm sure you have similar items hidden in your room."

"I do, well, a lot more toys and no playboy, I'm not really interested in naked woman posing by pools and touching themselves. And hey, I'm not afraid to admit that I'm horny all the time, I am. Speaking of that, I wouldn't be lying on her bed if I were you, there's probably a good reason the sheets are messed up." A smug grin appeared on Hannah's face as she spoke.

Aria sat up somewhat quickly, realizing what Hannah meant, she slid off Spencer's bed and tripped over the comforter. Hannah giggled as Aria stood up in a huff; she picked up the comforter and threw it on Spencer's bed.

"Wow, thanks for that." Aria said sarcastically, she crossed her arms and glanced back over at the bed. She noticed a black sweatshirt bundled up in the comforter. Aria untangled it and held it up for Hannah to see, a letter fell out of the pocket onto the ground.

They both stared at it briefly, neither one of them moving. Until Aria decided to pick it up. She unfolded it to see Toby's name on the front of the letter. She looked over at Hannah, wondering if she should open it. A date was written on the back, it was tomorrows date. Aria handed it over to Hannah, "Should we open it?" Hannah shrugged and very carefully pealed the flap of and slid the letter out.

_Spencer,_

_ I knew you couldn't resist the urge to open this, I also new that if I told you it was for you, you wouldn't have waited until the date on the seal. So thank you for at least having the decency to wait for the proper day to read it._

_Now that you are reading, I want you to know that I am sorry for tricking you into meeting me the other evening; it was the only way I could think of to get you to come. I couldn't tell you everything that I needed too because our conversation was being 'monitored' (for a better lack of words). And it was a set up, too many people that are involved were there and things had to go exactly according to plan._

_I can't tell you everything right now, because I don't know everything just yet. I can tell you that Shana, Melissa and I are protecting you from Red Coat; we were the ones who pulled you out of the fire. It may not seem like it, but we are on your side. Mona is with us too, now, for the most part. The other girls can't know about this, it needs to stay secret for now. At least until we have something on A, if it gets out, Hannah's mom will be forced to take the blame for Wilden's murder and there would be no way to prove her innocence. And with her conviction, eyes would be back on you four again._

_I can give you some answers to other things though, I need you to trust me, Spencer it's the only way that we are going to get through this. _

_Yesterday, the wire in your car leading from the battery to the ignition was cut by us, as was the text message you received from Emily's phone. She'll get it back in the mail in the next few days. So ignore all of that. I'm going to assume that you cheated on Toby last night, which is one of the reasons that Emily came into the mix. The one thing I ask is that when you break up with Toby, is that you make it messy. He needs to leave town, it's the only way he will be safe. There is another reason Emily had to leave, but I don't know details. Mona is certain that Red Coat is going to target Emily first and having her out of town screwed things over for them. I know you love Emily, so protect her. I think if something happened to one of you, the game would be over for Red Coat and also the person who is actually A._

_Paige needs to get out of the picture, but I'm leaving that for you to figure out. I believe that she is involved with the A team somehow, but she doesn't know much as her emotions tend to get the best of her and A is far from stupid. I say A, because I actually don't know who it is. Mona thought she was working for Red Coat to begin with but she wasn't, she was working for A, so was Lucas, Garrett, Toby, you and plenty of other unfortunate souls. It's really complicated and I can't explain it all here. I'm leaving things at that. I don't know when or if I will see you again. So I guess this is goodbye. Please, be smart and trust me. -Jenna_

_And for the record, Spencer, I never blamed you for what happened in the tree house. I didn't blame Aria, Emily or Hannah either. I know exactly what happened and Allison got what she deserved for it. And Spencer, please burn this. If someone else got a hold of it, I don't know what I would do._

"Oh, my, god." Aria said as she finished reading, Hannah folded the letter back up and put it back exactly the way she found it, Aria started to rant, "Do we confront Spencer? Do we pretend that we didn't find this? Why the hell did you want to search her house? It was a stupid idea, I told you so, god we should have just let it be. Should we call her? Hannah? What do we do?"

"Calm down."

For the first time in a very, very long time, Hannah was speechless. Aria shot Hannah a questioning look. It was as if their roles in their friendship, their personalities, had reversed, it wasn't like Aria to go into a rambling mess. Aria bit her tongue and sat back down on the bed.

"Sorry Han. This is just, incomprehensible." Aria looked up at Hannah, who wore a hurt expression. She sat down beside Aria and stuffed the letter back into the sweatshirt pocket.

Hannah finally spoke, she felt kind of sick about everything, but needed to say something, "Spencer hasn't read this. She doesn't know any of this, which means the only thing she is keeping is that she met up with Jenna last night, thinking she was meeting A and that she had alternate motives for taking Emily out of Rosewood. There were probably stakes involved and she was protecting us… Damn it, she is so stupid sometimes, she could have gotten..." Hannah trailed off, feeling overly emotional at this point. Aria laid her head on Hannah's shoulder and they sat in silence for what felt like hours.

* * *

Cars sped by along the city sidewalk as Emily and Spencer made their way to the hotel. It was a few blocks from the parking garage, and right around the corner from the restaurant where they ate dinner.

A soft breeze grazed Emily's skin, sending a euphoric feeling through Emily's veins. Yes, they were trapped in New York City for the night and her cell phone was probably in the hands of a hobo, but she felt wonderful about the current circumstances. She was with Spencer and she felt invincible.

"I can't believe I lost my phone. I blame you." Emily said, a smile formed lightly on her lips, but she was trying to be playfully serious in a sense. She wanted to be light, but also get her point across about how incredible the day had been.

"Oh? And how is it my fault?" Spencer was curious as to Emily's logic.

"Because I was having such a wonderful time with you that I lost track of reality." Emily blushed; her words definitely didn't come out the way she wanted them to. 'Lost track of reality' that's corny, she felt stupid now.

Emily was adorable, everything about her was adorable. Spencer looked at her questioningly for a moment, but then continued walking towards the hotel. Trying to think of the right words to say in response, she couldn't decide if she should be serious or flirty, there were positive and negative outcomes to both approaches. She felt kind of silly for thinking so much into Emily's comment, she smirked, "I'm sorry I was such a distraction, I'm pretty awesome that way."

"A stubborn, conceited distraction."

"I love you too." Spencer laughed; she felt an awkward tightness in her chest. She would often tell her friends that she loved them, playfully of course. A habit she picked of from Hannah. But this time, she felt different, like the words meant something more and there was a much deeper meaning there. Her heart started pounding and she glanced over at Emily, who seemed equally as distracted.

Once they reached the hotel, Spencer held the door as Emily walked inside. The interior was beautiful, different shades of black and white was plastered against the walls, it was very classy. Like somewhere a famous writer or maybe poet would stay… or someone who appreciated the beautiful architecture.

Spencer marveled at the beautiful stairwell as they approached the counter. A man in his early 20's was perched behind the desk; he wore a black suit and held an old copy of a Jane Austin book in his hands, the title covered by his fingers.

"Welcome to Washington Square Hotel, Ladies, is there a specific room you would like to book?" He looked Emily up and down, obviously admiring her body.

Spencer clinched her teeth, annoyed at the way he was looking at her, "Yes, we'd like a room. Preferably one with a _king sized bed_." She wasn't even going to ask Emily if she wanted her own bed, they were sharing and that was that. Spencer slid her credit card and ID across the counter to the man, admiring the surprised expression that was plastered on his face.

Emily looked at Spencer and raised an eyebrow; she knew that Spencer was messing with the man, but she wondered if there was anything behind that; maybe a hint of jealousy at the way he was checking Emily out? Or maybe it was nothing; maybe Emily was imagining the tension and the way that Spencer seemed to put emphasis on the bed thing.

"Sure thing Ms. Hastings," He slid the ID and card back to Spencer as well as a room key, "Oh and my name is James, I'll be here _all_ evening. If there is anything you need, anything at all, feel free to call down here. I would be happy to assist you in _anyway_ possible."

Emily blushed, she felt uncomfortable at what he was getting at. She and Spencer left the desk without another word, just simply a 'thank you' smile. As they headed up the beautiful stairwell, Spencer whispered in Emily's ear, "What a horny pervert."

Spencer slid the room key in the door and walked inside to hold the door for Emily for like the 14th time that day. Emily appreciated how considerate Spencer was when it came to things like that. It was something that most people would over look, the concept of holding the door for someone else, it was polite and showed that she cared.

The hotel room was just as beautiful as the lobby. The walls painted in a mocha brown, with dim lighting spread across the room. A burgundy curtain spread across the window, matching the fluffy comforter that lay on top of the giant bed that Spencer insisted upon. Hardwood floor coated the entire room, giving it all a classy, upscale feeling. As did the paintings that were spread lightly across the walls and beside the window.

Spencer threw her purse beside the bed and fell flat on it, her back sinking into the mattress' foam. Emily smiled as she leaned against the bathroom trim, watching Spencer as she laid there. Emily's mind started going over the idea of sleeping beside Spencer tonight, it wasn't like they didn't share a bed because they did all the time. But something about this evening felt different, it felt romantic.

Spencer looked up at Emily, something about the way the light was hitting her checks, illuminated her entire being. Lust filled Spencer's eyes; she grabbed a fistful of the sheets in order to keep herself from taking Emily right then and there. She closed her eyes for a brief moment, trying to rid her mind of what she wanted to do to Emily.

Emily grabbed the door post tightly, feeling the same urge as Spencer. Emily's gaze cut into Spencer's face as she held her eyes shut, "What's on your mind, Spence?"

Spencer's heart started racing, she sat up quickly, looked at Emily and bit her lip. She didn't want to make the first move in fear that Emily might not want her in the way that she wants Emily. She quietly cleared her throat before speaking, "A lot. I really don't want this day to end; I don't want to go back to Rosewood… We should run away together." Spencer said with a laugh, she wanted it to seem light, even though she really did want to get the hell away from everything in her life, except for Emily.

"Running away won't fix our problems, Spence. Dealing with them is the only way to move on." Emily said, lowering her eyes at the ground. Memories from the past flooded Emily's mind. Maya, how she tried to run away and drown her sorrows with booze. And her arm injury, how she tried fixing it with drugs rather than dealing with it properly, hoping it would just go away. And all the many things that she tried running from in such a short amount of time. Tears filled her eyes from the guilt, "I'm sorry. I'm a hypocrite for saying that."

Spencer stood up and walked over to Emily and pulled her into a tight hug, she wondered how Emily could feel hypocritical. She was the strongest, bravest person that Spencer knew. Emily had faced so many things in the past few years and dealt with them, overcoming so many obstacles.

Warm tears trickled down Emily's cheeks, gently tickling Spencer's shoulder. Emily felt so safe in Spencer's arms, she knew that Spencer was the one person in this world that she could always count on, the one person that understood her and knew exactly what she needed. She loved her, as a friend, but also as more than that. The idea of telling Spencer terrified her, the thought that she could lose her best friend because of her feelings made her feel sick. Emily wanted Spencer more than anything, it had been going on for too long and after years of pushing her feelings away, she didn't know how much longer she could take it. She wanted to give into her emotions and just let herself go.

Emily pulled out of the embrace and looked Spencer in the eyes; they stood silently for what felt like hours, just looking at each other. Spencer leaned in slowly; she closed her eyes and gently captured Emily's lips with her own. They kissed slowly, it was chaste and wonderful. It demanded nothing and revealed everything, every question that ran though Emily's mind had been answered and every thought consumed with the idea that she was kissing Spencer Hastings, the woman that she had desired for so long was finally in her arms returning the feelings that she had been longing for. Spencer deepened the kiss, pushing Emily against the wall and wrapping her arms around her waist. Emily brought her hands up and tangled them in the brunettes, beautiful hair, tugging gently at the roots she begged for more. Emily slowly grinded her hips against Spencer's leg, but stopped once Spencer pulled away from the kiss to look at Emily. Emily immediately regretted it, "I'm sorry, I-"

"Don't be." Spencer cut her off and leaned back into the kiss, letting her hands roam up Emily's waist to her breast, she gently squeezed them as their kisses became hungrier. Emily cupped Spencer's ass, pulling her into a tighter embrace, their body's moved in sync as their kiss became more and more passionate.

"I've wanted you for so long, Em." Spencer was able to get out in between breaths; she grabbed the hem of Emily's shirt and quickly slid it over her head and undid her bra strap in a swift motion. Emily was impressed at how smoothly Spencer did that, normally it was an awkward moment of having to break away to take each others clothes off. Everything about this felt perfect.

Spencer broke the kiss again and looked down admiring Emily's torso; she leaned into Emily's neck and started kissing it, making her way down Emily's body. Emily moaned in reaction to Spencer's gentle kisses, she felt her legs getting weaker with ever kiss. Spencer took Emily's left nipple in her mouth and flicked it with her tongue as she sucked her other hand caressing the right nipple. Emily clinched her teeth together, trying to remember to breath, the intense amount of pleasure sent light tremors throughout her body. She pulled Spencer back up to her mouth and captured her lips again, Emily started unbuttoning Spencer's shirt as they slowly back up towards the bed. As they were inches away from the bed, Emily's back facing it; she pulled away from Spencer as she tugged the bra off of her shoulders and looked at her intensely. Emily stood silently for a moment, brushing the back of her fingers against Spencer's abs. Spencer raised her eyebrows fearing that she did something wrong, to make Emily change things from quick and hungry back to slow.

"Spence, you don't always get to be the one in charge." Emily spun Spencer around and pushed her roughly on the bed. She crawled on top of the brunette and pinned her arms to the sheets as she kissed her passionately. Emily ground her hips again against Spencer's lower stomach, the friction of their jeans sent immense pleasure through both of them. As Emily continued kissing her, she moved slowly hoping to torture Spencer with the tension. Spencer curled her toes in reaction, feeling the need for release; she wasn't sure how much more of this she could take. Emily started kissing down her chest, playing with Spencer's nipples as she made her way down to unbutton her skinny, dark jeans. Emily tugged Spencer's jeans off and kissed her thighs, focusing on building the pleasure. Spencer moaned again, pulling her legs up, hoping Emily would peel of her underwear soon. Emily pulled Spencer's legs back flat on the bed and slid her lips up Spencer's thigh to the strap of her underwear. Spencer ran her hands through Emily's hair as she took the strap between her teeth, pulled it up slightly and then let it snap again Spencer's skin. Leaving Spencer's underwear on, Emily kissed back up her body and found her lips again. Spencer tried to sit up, but Emily pinned her hands back down against the sheets before she could go anywhere. Their bodies pressed together tightly, Emily moved one of her hands to Spencer's breast and started playing with her nipple, twisting it gently and rolling it between her fingers.

"Emily, please." Spencer gasped between breaths.

"Please what?"

"Fuck me." Spencer said in a whisper. Emily pulled away and sat up so she was looking down at Spencer. She felt good being in control, seeing Spencer beg was one of the hottest things that she had ever seen, mainly because it empowered her.

"No. The best orgasms come from mental stimulation. I'm not going down on you until you come." Emily said, smiling smugly. Spencer glared at her in return, "Please, Em, I'm dying here."

"Not until you come." Emily teased, moving her hips slowly against Spencer's body. Emily started rubbing her own breast and tugging at her nipples. Spencer's jaw dropped at the sight, her body tingling, she grabbed a fist full of the sheets, hoping for something for her body to release the tension Emily kept building.

Emily closed her eyes and let out a quiet moan. Spencer bit her lip, two could play that game. She reached up and unbuttoned Emily's pants, tugging on them to come off; Emily rolled off of Spencer and slid her pants off. Spencer took that opportunity to take control, she rolled on top of Emily and started kissing her breasts again, moving back and forth from one to the other. Emily tugged Spencer's hair again, which only turned Spencer on even more and that didn't even seem possible. The competitive side of Spencer made her feel the need to torture Emily in an even meaner way. Spencer quickly slid down Emily's body, pulling her underwear off. Spencer looked down at Emily's pussy admiring the lustrous patch of pubic hair; she pulled Emily's underwear up to her nose and inhaled. Emily's eye's widened at the sight of Spencer's 'exotic' gesture. Spencer crawled back up Emily's body to place a deep kiss on her lips. Then she grabbed Emily's hands and tied them together using her underwear. Emily laughed as she realized what Spencer was doing, "I'm going to need those."

Spencer didn't respond, she kissed down Emily's body until she reached the patch of pubic hair. Spencer looked up to meet Emily's eyes; a wicked smile appeared on Spencer's face. Spencer blew gentle breaths of air, observing how such a little gesture made Emily squirm. She trailed her fingers gently on the inside of Emily's thighs, moving up in down, slowly increasing the speed.

"God, Spencer, come on." Emily said, her hips moving up and down, she needed Spencer inside of her. Spencer gave in; she parted Emily's lower lips and blew gently on her clit, feeling kind of nervous about her ability to please Emily that way. Emily moaned, encouraging Spencer to continue, she stuck her tongue inside Emily and proceeded to lick. Emily came almost instantly, her body shuddering from the intense amount of pleasure being released. Spencer didn't stop though, she continued to move in and out of Emily, alternating between licking and sucking until Emily proceeded to have multiple organisms. The sight of Emily coming sent Spencer into an earth shattering orgasm of her own.

Panting for air, Spencer crawled up beside Emily and lay next to her, her body still tingling from the sensations. Her mind racing at the thought of what was going on, the idea that she and Emily were having sex made her tingle even more inside.

Emily rolled onto her side to look at Spencer, "I believe that it's your turn."

* * *

**Sorry if the sex too slow. I wanted to make it somewhat realistic and give the idea that sex between two women is more than just getting inside each other. There is mental/emotional stimulation that is way more pleasing that just getting it up in there and over with, and it's often overlooked. ANy thoughts? Hope you all enjoyed it. I won't take as long to update next time (:**


	8. Not Everyone's a Lesbian, Hannah

So this is an extremely short, filler chapter (I wanted to atleast post something). I do apologize. I've had some…personal/relationship issues to deal with on top of my busy work schedule and they have been mentally and emotionally draining so I haven't spent any time writing because of it. Sorry.

Thanks to all who reviewed, I posted a few responses at the bottom.

* * *

Light from the hotel window shone brightly against Spencer's face, she opened her eyes to see her best friend lying next to her, wrapped loosely within the sheets. Spencer's arms wrapped around Emily's waist and their legs still intertwined. Spencer smiled, realizing that last night _did_ actually happen; it wasn't just a blissful dream. Emily was in her arms and Spencer felt invincible.

Spencer let her eyes wander down Emily's body, admiring her beautiful, smooth skin. She unwrapped an arm from Emily's waist and gently trialed her fingers down Emily's sides, appreciating every curve on her body. Spencer wondered how much longer she could stay like this, eventually, the day would have to start and they would have to talk about things.

A smile formed lightly at the tip of Emily's lips, even just the feeling of Spencer's fingers brushing against her skin sent little waves of euphoria throughout her entire body. Emily opened her eyes to see Spencer looking down at her chest, which was covered with a sheet; she blushed, suddenly feeling shy about her body. She wondered what was going through Spencer's mind at that very moment.

"Good morning, beautiful." Spencer said in a muffled, husky tone as their eyes met, she was nervous but felt the need to seem confident. What if Emily didn't want her? She had to stay strong and be understanding of the situation. She couldn't lose her best friend.

Emily leaned towards Spencer and captured her lips in a soft kiss; she pressed her breasts against Spencer's body, wanting to feel the contact once more before having to face the day. Spencer whimpered quietly as their bodies touched, giving Emily the confirmation that Spencer enjoyed last night as much as she did. Emily smiled pulling out of the kiss, "Spence, if we keep kissing I won't want to get up ever again."

"Good, we can stay here forever then." Spencer placed another kiss on Emily's lips and then leaned back to look at her again.

"That would be a very expensive bill." Emily chuckled.

"Yeah, well you're worth it." Spencer smiled but her tone was serious.

Emily sat up and let the sheet slide off of her body. Spencer let her eyes scan Emily's body, wanting so badly to kiss every inch of it. An uncomfortable throbbing started to pound in Spencer's core; she would have appreciated the arousal if Emily didn't want to get up. Spencer rolled onto her back and stared up at the ceiling, trying to distract her mind from the beautiful woman that sat beside her.

"We should probably talk about things…" Emily trailed off, hoping Spencer would be upfront about what she wanted from her. Emily stood up and walked towards the window, she opened the curtains letting the sun light up the room. Emily stood at the window ceil and gazed out at the busy New York streets, mainly to keep her eyes off of Spencer. Spencer didn't respond so Emily continued, "I understand if you don't want to do this, the whole idea of coming out to people and building a relationship with another woman can be scary. It can take a lot of time, especially coming out to your parents and friends and if it's not something you want, please just be honest about it, I understand. I understand if you don't want to be judged everywhere you go, just because of who you love and I'd understand if it will affect your future career. But just know that whatever you choose, I won't let our friendship get ruined, you mean way too much to me to let anything get in the way of that."

"Emily…I…" Spencer wasn't sure exactly what to say, which was continuing to drive her insane. Without words, Spencer felt helpless and vulnerable, as if they shielded her from any verbal situation.

Spencer stood up and walked over to stand beside Emily, they both stood silently staring outside at the people below, not caring if anyone saw them up there. The silence was eating Emily away she needed a response from Spencer, "Also, you know if this was one of those experimenting things, I understand. We could forget it ever happened and just continue things the way they were and not ev-"

Emily was cut off by being pulled into a deep, wanting kiss. The kiss took Emily's breath away and Spencer smiled, knowing exactly what it did, "You talk too much, Em." Spencer laughed nervously, as she looked away from Emily to focus on the cars passing through the street below; she continued talking, "I don't care about what other people think, I don't care if it keeps me from getting jobs just because people are homophobic bastards, I don't care if my parents or friends or anyone for that matter will accept it or not. Emily, you are the most beautiful, caring, understanding person that I know, you are compassionate and selfless and strong. And your happiness is what I care about the most, if you want me, than you will have me because… well, because I love you. Okay, I'm in love with you and I have been for quite a while, I guess I just didn't understand what love was until I saw you with Paige. And she had everything that I had ever wanted, I was incredibly jealous of her and everything she had, but I couldn't say anything about it because you seemed so happy with her. And I want you to be happy, even if it means being with someone else. So to answer your question, I want to do this. I want you, more than anything. And being with you and the views people may have on it won't matter, because it's not a 'lesbian relationship' it's just a relationship, no different from anyone else's and I won't have people treating it like it is different. Love is love." Spencer was staring into Emily's eyes at this point, she was crying silently as she spoke and Emily was in shock. She pulled Spencer in for a hug and they stood silently for a while, until Spencer's phone beeped. Spencer stiffened and Emily pulled out of the embrace to grab Spencer's phone off the table. Instead of opening it, Emily handed it to Spencer.

Spencer relaxed once she saw the name on the screen, it was Aria. She wanted to know where they were and that she was worried about them. Spencer looked up at Emily, wondering if there was more they had to discuss, she wondered where things between them were going to go.

"Spence, maybe you should call her. I'll hop in the shower why you do."

"Did you want some company, I can call her afterwards…" Spencer trailed off, staring lustfully at Emily's naked body, she felt herself getting wet just at the sight of her.

"I don't think that will help us in the process of leaving. I appreciate the offer though." Emily walked forward to place a kiss on Spencer's cheek and than walked towards the bathroom.

Spencer watched Emily as she walked away, the feeling of their bodies intertwined still lingering in Spencer's mind. She felt ecstatic, she quickly found Aria's name in her phone and hit send.

After a few rings, Aria answered, her voice muffled and groggy, "Spencer, where are you? I've been really worried."

"Everything's fine, better than fine, actually. Emily and I are at a hotel in New York. I had some car trouble last night and she suggested we stay the night."

"Car trouble?" Aria's voice was accusing, she didn't mean for it to sound that way, but she obviously couldn't believe Spencer, especially after the letter that they found.

Aria and Hannah agreed to keep the letter a secret. They were going to wait until after Spencer read it to see if she would tell them. But Aria couldn't help but wonder why Spencer wouldn't tell them about things in the first place, she felt hurt and betrayed in a sense.

"Yeah, I'll explain later. There's something we need to talk about, could we meet up tonight, at the Lake House around maybe 10? Just you, me and Hannah though."

"Did something happen with Emily?"  
"Emily's fine, it's just that, it would just be easier to tell you two first."

"I meant between you and Emily?"

"Aria, can we talk later?"

"Of course, I'll see you tonight. Drive safe, ok?"

"Thank you mother, bye," Spencer hung up the phone and tossed it on the bed; she lay down on top of the messy sheets, her mind quickly leaving her conversation with Aria and grabbing hold of the thought of Emily.

Spencer closed her eyes and slid her hands up her stomach; she gently squeezed her breast, and then brushed her hands across her nipples. After watching them grow erect, Spencer started to squeeze and flick them, sending tingles to her already throbbing core. Her mind going back to what Emily said about mental stimulation. She thought about Emily touching her, her breath skimming across every inch of Spencer's skin. Emily straddling her and grinding her hips against Spencer's body. Spencer rolled onto her stomach and wrapped her legs around a pillow; she started grinding against it, focusing on every sensation coursing through her body. Feeling her nipples press roughly against the bed and feeling the friction that was caused between the pillow and her center. She curled her toes as all of the muscles in her body tighten, as they released Spencer moaned, whispering Emily's name. She continued humping the pillow as she came, grinding roughly against the bed. Spencer lay still, wanting to feel everything that she just experience over again. She felt incredible, discovering the new sensations that she overlooked in the past, the simple things that could turn her on and get her off. She would lie in that bed all day, with or without Emily, if she had the stamina to do so, but after everything that happened last night, she was pretty exhausted.

"Wow that was really fucking hot, Spence." Emily said in a low, sexy tone.

Spencer bit her lip, hearing Emily swear was one of the sexiest things she's ever heard. She turned around to see Emily leaning against the wall beside the bathroom; she was wrapped loosely in a fluffy towel, standing in an uncomfortable looking position. Emily had been watching since Spencer got off the phone with Aria, she didn't hear the conversation, but she did get to enjoy the opportunity of watching Spencer pleasure herself. And now Emily was feeling the need for another shower, preferably a cold one.

Spencer blushed, feeling uncomfortable. She wasn't sure what to say, she wanted to say something sexy or humorous, but again, words eluded her. So she stared blankly at Emily, feeling stupid about being caught masturbating.

"I think I could use another shower though, join me?" Emily dropped her towel and walked back into the bathroom, glancing back at Spencer seductively. Spencer hopped up and walked quickly into the bathroom, slamming the door shut behind her.

* * *

"Anything else I can get for you while you wait for your friend?" A waitress asked Hannah for the third time in the past 15 minutes. Hannah clinched her teeth and smiled uncomfortably. The woman used the word friend, Hannah wasn't meeting a 'friend' and it bothered her to think that people might think they are friends, because they aren't.

"My _associate_ should be here any minute; she's running late I guess." Hannah felt like a business woman using the word associate, but it was business in a sense.

"Well, if for some reason she doesn't show, I would be glad to join you. My name is Bri by the way. And I'm off in 30 minutes… just a thought." With that, Bri flashed Hannah a smile and walked away toward the back room of the café.

Hannah smiled, as she subconsciously started to shred a napkin with her fingers, she wondered if all waitresses were flirts. Ever since Emily came out of the closet, more and more people seemed gay, like wherever Hannah would go, ladies would hit on her. Emily would joke and say that all women are gay, most just choose the safe route of convincing them-selves that they like men. Hannah thought it was funny, but was now starting to wonder about that.

"Sorry I'm late." Paige said, snapping Hannah out of her deep train of thought. Hannah looked up at Paige, forcing a fake smile to taint her lips.

"I haven't been here long. I- um" Hannah was distracted by Bri appearing again, she was walking towards the table, carrying a water for Paige. The waitress smiled as she made eye contact with Hannah. Hannah couldn't decide if she was flattered that the girl was hitting on her, or annoyed that she might think that Hannah was interested.

"Do you ladies know what you'd like or should I come back?" Bri asked, not taking her eyes off of Hannah. Hannah smiled uncomfortably under her gaze, "I'm good actually; coffee is all I wanted."

"I'll take a grilled cheese and some English Tea." Paige said, forcing the waitress to look at her. She smiled, nodded and left without another word. Paige looked up at Hannah with a grin plastered on her face, "She's totally hot for you."

Hannah rolled her eyes; she knew that, she wasn't blind. She didn't really feel the need to exchange pleasantries with Paige though, that's why she didn't order anything, it was down to business, "Why do you think that Spencer is A? I need details."

"Not A, part of the A team. I told you about the phone we traced back to Spencer. Plus two nights ago I got a text from A telling me where to go, I went there, and saw Spencer and A having a conversation. I snapped a photo, but once they saw me they both ran. I chased Spencer, but got knocked out from behind and don't remember anything else from that night. When I woke up my phone was missing. Today it appeared in the mailbox, it was wiped clean so now I have no proof. I know it might sound crazy, but it's true, Spencer's with A. And I kno-"

"I want to help you." Hannah took a sip of the disgusting coffee that sat in front of her, while Paige stared blankly. Hannah was ready for some answers and she was going to get them on way or another.

"What?"

"I believe you, Paige, and I want to help you prove that Spencer is A."

* * *

Breyanaxo: Sorry it took so long again to update this time, I'll be writing more often now. Your comment made me smile though, I felt like a little kid being scolded. :P

Craycrayforshay: Thanks, I'm glad you are enjoying it as it progresses. Speaking from Emily's point of view, I don't think she actually realized what she was doing by cheating on Paige. Like the reality wasn't there, if that makes any sense. So the break up may be rough.

Cammae Greene: I am so not sorry (; Thank you though, it means a lot to hear someone say that they are impressed with me. I'm glad you found the sex to be elegant and realistic, that was my hope for it. So thank you.

Guest: I'm not really sure how to address you. But thank you all who posted under guest comments. I don't think Spencer Hastings will have any trouble coming out. But their will be angst, just in different ways than you are probably expecting.

Spemily: Thanks, I'm glad you think I made a good point with things being slow. I've found that most portrayals (that a lot of people see) of sex between women are often misconceptions of what it really is.

Yourbiggestfan: When I read your comment, I was in the library and I disturbed about ten people with giggles. I could manage to do one of those things, if only I knew you (;

Spinoza-off: It's great to hear from you (: I'm glad you are intrigued so far, I usually tend to ruin mystery when I start adding other aspects of the story, so it's nice to know it's still there. I'm excited for you and everyone else to get to read the next chapter, I think what Hannah and Aria do is very… different than what you would expect.


	9. Two Plus Two Equals Nine

You can thank a can (or maybe two) of Mike's Harder Blueberry Lemonade for this chapter. I've been back and forth with where I want to take this and the third write is a charm. Hope it was worth the wait and thank you all that reviewed as well as those who are still reading. Honestly, the fact that there are people out there reading my writing and not saying it's "that which comes out of a horse's booty" makes me incredibly happy and is really encouraging. So thank you again. Replies/thoughts about what you said about the previous chapter are at the end (:

* * *

Emily paced nervously across her front deck; she pulled her cell phone out of her pocket to check the time, it was 5:42 pm, a minute had gone by since the last glance, and her friend was now 12 minutes late. Normally the terrible punctuality wouldn't bother her, but Emily had kept what happened between she and Spencer balled up inside for half the day and she _needed_ to tell someone. It could have been that what happened was so incredibly unreal that she needed a reality check to actually verify that what happened was indeed, real, that she wasn't stuck in some terribly realistic dream… or maybe it was the guilt of cheating on Paige that was getting to her. She really didn't know.

The silver car finally pulled into the drive way and Emily ran down to greet the brunette. The moment she opened the car door, Emily lost control of the words that had been floating around her mind for the entire day, the words that she couldn't manage to say out loud until this very moment, "Spencer and I had sex."

Aria's eyes widened at her friends quick, somewhat shocking (yet not so shocking at all) confession. Emily covered her mouth quickly, like a little kid who just said a bad word for the first time and Aria couldn't help but giggle.

"And to think, I thought I would have to pry it out of you," Aria said, smiling as blood rushed to Emily's face.

"You knew?" Emily asked. She and Aria walked up to Emily's front porch and sat on the swing. It was kind of like their spot, for talking about things. Not necessarily deep things, just things in general, but sometimes deep things… or secrets.

"Em, no offence, but the sexual tension between you and Spencer was like the- it was like trying to walk through Hannah's room after she uses hair spray," Aria laughed, but was met with a confused look from Emily, "Thick and incredibly hard to ignore."

Emily couldn't help but smile at Aria's ridiculous comparison; it made a lot of sense though. If she felt a huge amount of tension around Spencer, it had to be noticeable to everyone around them. Emily's cheeks flushed a bit deeper as the blush spread though her face, making her ears burn slightly. She looked Aria in the eyes and her tone got serious, "So you are ok with it?"

"That you and Spencer had sex?" Aria asked sarcastically.

"No. That we might potentially get together and well, be a couple."

"Emily, you are asking if I'm okay with it. What kind of question is that? I'm really happy for you; it's obvious how much you care about her in _that _way. Have you… have you ended things with Paige?" Aria wasn't sure if she should go there, she felt like she should ask how it was so that Emily could gush on about how incredible Spencer was (even though she didn't exactly want details on how Spencer was in bed). Emily seemed so happy about her and Spencer that maybe Paige would be the wrong way to go. But at the same time, Emily needed to face the reality of the situation. Paige was still Emily's girlfriend and Emily needed to properly end things with her. It was just the way it had to be. Emily still cared about Paige, deeply, just not in a romantic type way anymore. But Paige didn't deserve to be cheated on. And Emily could ramble about sex with Spencer after she was no longer considered a cheater.

"I'm going too, later this evening." Emily lowered her eyes feeling guilty, she didn't want to talk about things with Paige she just wanted them to be over… if only life was easy.

"That's good." Aria said; it was barley auditable.

Emily looked at her friend for a moment, studying her face, something was off. Something about the tone in Aria's voice and just the expression she wore. It was as if she was debating something and couldn't decide if she wanted to actually talk about it. Emily pressed her lips together trying to decided what to say, she completely discarded the Paige thing, she was done talking about it, "What's wrong, Aria?"

"Nothing," She said, feeling pressure under Emily's gaze.

"I thought we weren't keeping things from each other?" Emily asked. Her tone was innocent and somewhat hurt; it made Aria feel extremely guilty.

Aria's heart race increased as she debated telling Emily. She decided that she was going to tell her friends… but with all that was going on right now, it might be a bad time. Especially under the circumstances, her situation was complicated enough as it is and telling someone, actually saying it out loud, would have made it real. Or so it seemed, things always seemed more real after actually talking about them. And this wasn't something Aria could just ignore to make it go away, actually that probably would have made everything worse.

"Emily, I-I'm not sure exactly how this happened. Well okay, I know _how_ it happened but I don't really understand how it happened and I-"

"What happened?"

"I'm… pregnant." Aria said, looking away from Emily's gaze to take interest in the hole in her left sleeve, it was really little this morning, but picking at it seemed to distract Aria's mind in some bizarre way. She was waiting for Emily to say something, but the silence was getting to her, "I'm pregnant, Emily." Aria looked back to face Emily, wondering if her friend actually heard her the first time or if she just said it in her head.

"I… is it-"

"It's Ezra's." Aria cut Emily off before she could even ask. Aria knew for a fact that it was his. She and Jake weren't yet sexually active, and probably weren't ever going to be now. Aria knew something was going on with her body, but she was in denial, that's why she drank last weekend, but also why she didn't get wasted in fear that her presumption was true. She wasn't ready for this.

"Wow. This is great, I mean, you're going to be a mom." Emily let the first words that came to mind come out. She wasn't sure what to think, let alone say. She felt like Aria was terrified of this revelation and Emily wanted to be comforting, but she didn't exactly know how especially because she didn't know how Aria felt about it.

"Great? Em, were still in high school, A is around every corner, Ezra and I aren't together and I feel like everything I know is a lie. Everything in my life is falling apart, how is this great?" Aria spat, now feeling angry. She hoped for some advice on what to do about it, maybe Emily suggesting an abortion would have eased her guilt a bit, but did she really expect her to keep it?

"What do you want me to say then?" Emily felt helpless; she bit her lip hoping for an answer.

"What you think… What do you think?"

"I think that if anyone was going to have a kid, it should be you. Aria, you are going to be the best mom in the world. You are so good with kids and you're mature and know what to do, even when no one else has a clue. I think you are going to be fine; we'll get through this together. You know that we're here for you and I'm sure I can speak for Hannah and Spence; they are going to be so excited. Especially Han, god, Hannah is going to flip." Emily smiled; she took Aria's hand and rested her other hand on her friend's knee. Emily was good at comfort for the most part, which made her wonder if that's why Aria was telling her right now instead of Hannah or Spencer or anyone else for that matter.

Aria pulled Emily into a tight hug and started to cry from the frustration and the excitement, the emotions were overwhelming. Emily started to gently run her fingers down Aria's hair, hoping to give comfort, "We'll get through this together."

* * *

"I totally knew you two would hook up, jesus, Spence how was she? I want details." Hannah gushed; she was waiting for this moment for quite a while. Hannah totally shipped 'Spemily' as she would call them whenever she would talk about it with Aria. But it wasn't like she could say anything before, it would have ruined things.

"Umm no," Spencer said, trying to shrug away a blush. She felt kind of smug, like she had power keeping it to herself. The moment Hannah and Aria arrived at the Lake House, Hannah jumped Spencer with questions. Aria may have _accidentally_ spilled about Spencer and Emily on the drive up.

"Come. On. Spencer. You know you want to talk about it." Hannah nudged Spencer in the side causing her to spill some of the juice from her mug. Aria laughed as Spencer glared at Hannah. They had been in the kitchen for maybe 2 minutes and Hannah was already making a mess.

Spencer didn't want to talk about it as she was worried she might say too much and make Emily upset, but Hannah wasn't about to give up so Spencer had to say something, "It was amazing… Emily is… she just amazing."

"Spencer Hastings at a loss for words, this is a rare occasion." Aria joked, making reference to the fact that out of Spencer's vast vocabulary she repeated the same, vague word twice.

"Seriously, that's all you're going to say?" Hannah asked; disappointment was clear in her tone.

"I'm not going to give you a play by play on what happened, Han. It was simply amazing; everything about Emily is just…"

"Amazing?" Aria cut her off, she was enjoying teasing Spencer for once. It was nice to have a light conversation; it felt like things were like they use to be but only for a few short minutes.

"If you want details, ask Emily. I'm not talking about this now… there's something I need to tell you guys and well; I'm not sure how to say it." Spencer rambled, feeling frustrated for her continuous lack of words. She thought it was just around Emily or because of Emily but it proved to be a reoccurring event, a very irritating, reoccurring event. She took a deep breath and let it out loudly before continuing, "I met up with A the other night. Well, that's not true. I thought I was meeting up with A, but it turned out to be Jenna Marshall. She was… she isn't a part of the A team or so she says, but she said she wants to help us, she set me up to make me look really guilty for Paige, I'm not sure why, but she did give us some answers." Spencer pulled the crumpled up letter out of her pocket and offered it to Hannah and Aria.

Aria and Hannah looked at each other, both feeling guilty. Aria took the letter from Spencer and sat it down on the kitchens' island. She pressed her lips together forming a hard line, she was hoping that maybe Hannah would want to confess to what they did, but Hannah stood silently, adverting her gaze from both of her friends.

"We may have already read the letter…" Aria mumbled, hoping Spencer wouldn't flip.

"You what?" Spencer didn't think that she quite heard what Aria said.

"We read the letter. We were looking for the phone that Paige mentioned, but found this instead."

"Plus a few other items, who knew you were so kinky Spence?" Hannah added in, hoping that maybe humor would lighten up the bone crushing tension that buzzed between them.

"Shut the hell up, Hannah." Aria snapped, way too harshly. Hannah and Spencer both looked at her in shock. She immediately felt awful, "Sorry."

"You searched my house? You don't trust me…" Spencer trailed off, feeling hurt by her friends betrayal.

"No that's not it at all, Spencer, I told Paige that I think you are A. After we searched your house, it made it believable to her that we doubted you before I spoke with her." Hannah defended.

"That's because you did." Spencer's eyes were watering; she wasn't going to cry though. She had no need to cry, crying was nothing more than weakness leaving the body and Spencer Hastings was nothing near weak.

"No, we were looking for the phone and had the opportunity too. It had nothing to do with trust; it had to do with opportunity." Aria backed Hannah up, hoping not to make things worse for them. Aria knew it was a bad idea to begin with but it did help convince Paige, so there was something good coming from it.

"So Paige thinks you think that I'm A." Spencer asked to clarify things.

"Yes. Well, no. She thinks you are working with A." Aria answered, hoping things wouldn't escalate again.

"Alright, well I guess we have something to work with now." Spencer said, feeling better about the situation.

"Time to con the conman." Hannah said.

"What?" Spencer and Aria asked at the same time.

"It was a figure of speech." Hannah defended. She had a point of some sort. There was something off about Paige and they were going to figure things out one way or another.

* * *

The sunlight was starting to fade as Emily sat silently on the bench not far from the cemetery. She wanted to do this somewhere that she wouldn't see everyday, she didn't want to constantly be reminded of what she was about to do.

Paige was late. That seemed to be the theme for the day, running late. But Emily didn't mind this time, it gave her a bit more time to get her thoughts in order.

Her heart ached at the thought that she was going to hurt the woman that she used to love. But thinking about that made Emily wonder, why? Why was she in love with Paige? What made her fall for the seemingly perfect, competitive swimmer that Emily once hated? Maybe it was the similarities that Paige had to Spencer. It sounded silly at first to compare the two, but really thinking about it, they were so similar. They are both competitive, very stubborn, have an awkward yet lovable sense of humor, they both are clever and brainy and loyal and beautiful and well, they both treated Emily like she meant the world to them. It hurt to think about it, that maybe the only reason that she ever liked Paige is because she couldn't actually have Spencer, well she didn't think she could anyway.

Paige cleared her throat, startling Emily. Emily's eyes seemed to give away her thoughts that Paige saw coming, "I know why you wanted to meet up with me tonight… I just have one question for you," Paige asked, lowing her eyes, she seemed more hurt than upset with Emily.

"Paige, I-"

"Did you fuck her?" Paige asked abruptly, cutting Emily off.

"What?" Emily was taken aback by the question and the hate in Paige's tone, guilt plagued Emily's face, which answered the other girls question. She wasn't planning on telling Paige that she cheated, she felt guilty enough as it is, but having Paige find out would drive an even bigger stake between them, taking the option of friendship away.

Paige turned away from Emily and lowered her head; she was trying to stay calm and collected, she knew this was coming, she felt it in the way that things between them had been, so distant and uncomfortable. Paige had accepted the fact that she and Emily had to break up eventually, especially because of the fact that Paige was leaving for college next year and Emily wasn't. But this was just too much.

"I don't know you anymore, Emily, this person you've become is not the person that I fell in love with. You're a liar and you are so blind. Spencer is the enemy, she's going to destroy you and your friends and there is nothing I can do to stop it. I can't protect you if you won't let me. And I can't be here for you anymore. I'm sorry we wasted time on each other, but most of all, I'm sorry that you are so naive, falling for _her_, I'm sure that's part of the plan. She won't leave Toby for you, they are comfortable and he can give her what you can't. You're just a pawn, Emily." With that Paige walked away, leaving Emily alone on her front porch.

Emily cried silently, the words cut through her life knives, leaving her to bleed. Paige meant a lot to her, they spent a year together and had gone though so much. But Paige changed, something happened and Emily couldn't pinpoint it. And hearing Paige say that they were a waste of time broke something inside of Emily that she didn't even know it was there. Maybe a sense of trust, that other people could actually care for her, maybe love was nothing more than a conspiracy of two people trying to convince themselves that they should be together for some fucked up, selfish reason. That maybe someone could bring happiness, true happiness, that couldn't be found anywhere else. Or maybe it was all just a load of bullshit that meant nothing. She wasn't certain.

Emily sat for a few hours on that bench, unsure of where to go. She wanted to call Spencer, but she didn't want to talk about Paige with her. And Hannah and Aria were out of the question, Aria had enough to deal with and Hannah, well Hannah would want to do something about it and Emily felt like enough damage had been done.

After wallowing alone in her thoughts, Emily's phone started flashing and she opened the screen to see a photo slowly load. It was hard to tell what exactly was on the screen, it looked kind of like a stretcher in the woods, and a few men in dark blue uniforms surrounded it. It was too dark to decipher exactly what was in the picture. Below the photo read the other half of the text,

"**Local girl found dead in river"  
****-A**

* * *

That's all I got for now. But don't think you know who's in that river because it could be a number of 'local girls' sooo ha (:

Thanks for reading, everyone. Btw, after reading my past posts, I feel like I sound like I have low self-esteem. To clarify, I don't. But keep in mind that being a writer/writing is a scary process and I'm thankful for all the people that do bare their time/souls in writing whether it is fanfiction or any type of writing that leaves them vulnerable as a person. It's a hard thing to do and I admire the people that do it and thank the ones that read it or review. Soo no low self esteem, just the need to explain my thoughts for fear of being mistaken. I feel like I can relate to Spencer in that way. :P  
M'kay, I'm done being emotionalish.

Ninjagojay246: I don't think Hannah could ever betray her friends. I was considering it, but that's just no Hannah, she's too loyal. But that doesn't mean that she can't pretend... or maybe she could betray her friends and I'm just making it seem like she can't to convince you otherwise...? I try to be clever, but I'm really not. (:

Sara1287: Thanks for reading (:

Spemily: Thanks, I'm glad that you are enjoying the story. I hope this "very long, over do update" was up to par or so to say (:

Becca: Your comment made me grin like an idiot for quite a while. I'm so glad that you took the time to read my story. I've been a die hard PLL fan since the books and getting to know the characters has been such a journey that I was afraid I wouldn't quite capture the ones from the show, but I'm really glad to hear that the dialog is believable. I love these characters as if they were actually a part of my life (That sounds kind of weird as I read it back, but I think that's how fictional characters should be, at least well developed ones and they are so well developed that writing them is so interesting from my part). I'm glad the sex scene felt realistic. I didn't want it to be considered as porn or hard smut, (Not that I would mind terribly) but at the same time it is what it is. But your comment really meant a lot, so thank you. I hope the story continues to keep your attention. (:

... I like smiley faces (:


	10. Sticks and Stones

Apologies for the lack of updating; time is flying by. Some of you are going to be terribly unhappy for what I have done... Enjoy.

_Oh and hey, I posted a new fic for the Secret Circle (show) you should definitely check it out! I'll be posting an update for _this_ fic by next weekend (:_

* * *

Emily immediately called Spencer once she received the text; they agreed to meet up at the Lake House to discuss the photo on Emily's phone. Spencer offered to call Hannah and Aria to tell them to head over, she didn't want Emily to know they were all there without her.

After Aria and Hannah's confession of reading the letter from Spencer's jacket, and their agreement to get what they could out of Paige, Spencer asked Hannah and Aria not to tell Emily about everything just yet. But with the news they just received about a dead body, Spencer had a feeling that whoever the girl in the river was, must have been someone that had something to do with Emily. It made her worry. And it made her wonder if they should tell Emily about the entire situation at hand.

"Oh my God, who is it?" Hannah asked, she held Emily's phone in her hand, pulling the phone closer to her face. She squinted as if it would help make the photo clearer, obviously it didn't help.

"How should I know?" Emily asked as she leaned against the kitchen counter and crossed her arms tightly against her chest; her emotions were all over the place. She felt paranoid about the body, someone that they knew was dead, but if they were to go around asking questions it would seem suspicious especially since this probably wasn't public news yet. So there really was nothing that they could do about things with that. The ache of Paige's harsh words still buzzed around her mind, she felt awful about how things ended and she wondered if Paige really meant what she said about things between them being a waste of time. Emily knew she should just forget about it though, especially because nothing could be done. But at the same time, another distraction flushed through Emily's mind, she felt butterflies in the pit of her stomach, and her knees felt weak at the sight of Spencer. The dark purple V-neck Spencer was wearing tugged tightly against her abs and hung low on her neck giving a slight glimpse of her chest; it sent tingles into Emily's core. It was a nice distraction, very nice indeed; the one thing she wanted to focus on was her feelings for Spencer. She wondered where they stood; it wasn't something they fully discussed, but agreed to tomorrow morning.

"Is your mind still on last night?" Aria whispered quiet enough so only Emily could hear; although Spencer and Hannah were so focused on the photo that Aria probably could have yelled it and it wouldn't have made a difference.

"This morning actually," Emily blushed, she let her eyes roam across Spencer's entire body again, wondering if they would get a chance to talk tonight.

"Wow, this morning too?" Aria chuckled. She noticed the way Emily was looking at Spencer and felt a warm feeling in her chest, she realized how much her they were actually into each other.

"Spencer is as horny as a teenage boy. I basically had to drag her out of that hotel room this morning… I'm not complaining though," Emily said in a hushed tone. It wasn't like Emily to brag, but she was ecstatic about everything that had happened between her and Spencer. Emily glanced down to see Aria's hand softly clutching her stomach, she knew it was only a matter of weeks until the baby started showing, she wondered when Aria was going to tell the others, "How are you feeling?" Emily whispered, gesturing to Aria's belly.

"What are you two whispering about?" Hannah asked startling Emily, she turned to face Hannah unsure of what to say.

"Nothing, do you guys have anything idea who it is?" Aria asked, pointing to Emily's phone.

"No, how could we? The photo doesn't give anything away. How do you even know that's a recent photo?" Spencer asked in a serious tone.

"We don't, Nancy Drew. Can we just forget about it for now? There isn't anything we can do and we have enough stress to be worrying over some photo that may or may not be real or new or whatever." Aria said some what harshly. The other three girls stared at Aria for a moment, unsure of what triggered her defensive attitude.

"PMS much? I need a drink," Hannah walked over to the cupboard beside the refrigerator and pulled out a bottle of vodka, she held it up to the others and shook it, "Whose up for a little game?"

Spencer rolled her eyes at Hannah's suggestion; of course they would spend the evening drinking. That's usually how every sleep over would go, they would talk a bit and then drink a lot. Maybe it was a good idea for the night though, if the dead body was just recently discovered and it did have something to do with Emily. They could use the Lake House as an alibi as to where they were that night, they were all about an hour out of Rosewood and it sounded great in case the police couldn't immediately identify when or how the body got there.

"A game sounds great." Spencer said, she pulled four shot glasses out from beneath the island and headed towards the living room. The others followed her in there, Spencer plopped down on the couch and Emily sat down beside her and Hannah and Aria sat on the sofa across from them.

"Truth or dare?" Hannah asked.

"That's generic and doesn't involve drinking." Spencer scowled.

"Hannah, we all know you are dying to hear about their night." Aria smiled and Hannah shot a glare at Aria. Hannah did want to know about last night, as far as details went. Two of her best friends couldn't just sleep together and not tell her about it, it was just plain wrong in Hannah's eyes. Spencer wasn't willingly going to give any details and Emily probably wouldn't have said much either, maybe a bit more than Spencer, but not what Hannah was looking for.

"I have a game in mind… I don't remember their name for it, but Ali told me about playing it with her field hockey friends." Emily spoke up, "It's like a mixture of truth or dare and never have I ever."

"That could be interesting." Hannah felt somewhat satisfied about the idea, "How do you play?"

"Okay. So you start out with a truth or dare question. The first person to get asked the question, gets to give a never have I ever scenario after they answer. And who ever has done it, the first person to drink gets to ask the next truth or dare question. Does that make sense?" Emily asked. She looked over at the shot glass that sat in front of Aria and met Aria's gaze with a concerned look.

"Sounds awesome! Why haven't we played this before?" Hannah asked, not really expecting an answer. She began to pour vodka into the glasses. Once she reached Aria's glass Aria blurted the first thing that came to mind, "Han, my stomach is kind of hurting, I think I'll pass on the alcohol tonight."

As Hannah stared blankly at Aria, Aria could see Hannah trying to think of some ridiculous reason to convince her that the alcohol would help. But Emily spoke before either of them could, "I saw some apple juice in the fridge, I'll grab that for you Ar." Emily stood up and left the room before anyone had a chance to speak. Emily wasn't gone long, she sat the apple juice down beside the vodka bottle and Aria gave her a 'thank you' smile. Hannah grudgingly poured it, annoyed that it would only be the three of them getting drunk tonight.

"Who should go first?" Spencer asked once they were all settled.

"I'll ask first, Emily, truth or dare?" Hannah said quickly.

Emily smiled, knowing exactly what Hannah's plan was, "Dare."

"Damn. Okay, I dare you to… to kiss Spencer." Hannah smiled.

"That's really lame, Han, they've obviously kissed." Aria said, she leaned over and whispered something in Hannah's ear. She smiled and looked over at Spencer.

"Fine, I dare Emily to take her shirt off and leave it off for the entire game." Hannah felt more satisfied with that dare anyway.

Emily raised her eye brows at Hannah, feeling like it was a stupid dare she pulled her shirt off and threw it on the floor, revealing her lacy black and red bra. Spencer shifted uncomfortably besides Emily on the couch, trying not to stare at Emily's body and Hannah smiled smugly. The dare made more sense now. Emily looked at Spencer for a moment before speaking, "Never have I ever punched Hannah… even though I've really wanted to."

The girls laughed as Spencer took a drink, "That's what she gets for scaring me. Anyways, Hannah, truth or dare?"

"Truth."

"Are you sure?"

"Um, no dare."

"I dare you to kiss Aria on the lips." Spencer said.

Hannah glared at Spencer for a long moment. She really didn't want to; she wanted to make up some dumb reason like that it would be cheating on Caleb or something like that. But Hannah knew they would make a big deal out of that. She looked over at Aria and let out an exasperated sigh; she leaned in slowly and gently met Aria's lips with hers. The kiss was really soft at first but once Aria pushed harder to deepen it, Hannah pulled away somewhat quickly. They looked at each other briefly until Spencer cleared her throat.

"Never have I ever ate a bug." Hannah said after thinking a bit, she was originally going to say that she's never kissed a girl, but that didn't work out.

"Eaten." Spencer corrected Hannah as she took a shot, "Aria, truth or dare?"

"Truth."

"How did kissing Hannah make you feel?" Spencer knew it was pretty mean to ask, but she felt the competitive side of her taking over and if it was Aria's fault that a shirtless Emily was sitting beside her.

"Frustrated." Aria answered.

"Why so?"

"No two part questions."

"We need more than a one word answer." Spencer raised an eyebrow, ready to challenge anything Aria had to say in return.

"Okay fine, sexually frustrated, it's been a while... Happy Spencer?"

"No, so kissing Hannah turned you on?"

"Now that would be a two part question."

"No, just clarification."

"Spencer, truth or dare?" Aria asked she was starting to get angry with Spencer.

"That's not how the game works, Aria." Spencer smiled smugly as she crossed her arms across her chest.

"The rules aren't specific, Spence." Emily defended Aria, she was curious as to where Aria was going.

"Is the only reason you fucked Toby because you were trying to convince yourself that you like guys? Were you just using him or did you actually like him inside of you?" Aria's words were full of anger, but she immediately regretted saying them as she watched Spencer's expression turn from smug to hurt and confused.

"Shit just got real." Hannah mumbled as Spencer stood up. Spencer looked at Emily then to Hannah and back to Aria, she stormed out of the room in anger.

"Very nice, Aria." Emily said, she stood up and ran after Spencer.

* * *

After about 15 minutes of searching for Spencer, Emily found her sitting up on the roof of the Lake House. Emily was irritated that Spencer didn't say anything while she was searching, but felt the need to be sympathetic to her friend. Emily climbed up the ladder on the side of the house and sat down beside Spencer, the cold wind swept across the roof, reminding Emily that she still wasn't wearing a shirt. She pulled her arms tightly across her chest. Spencer pulled off her jacket and handed it to Emily without saying a word.

"I'm sorry." Emily said in a whisper, she wasn't sure what to say to Spencer, but they needed to talk about things.

"Why would you be sorry?" Spencer didn't look at her.

"Because I egged Aria on, she wouldn't have said it if I hadn't defended her first," Emily felt awful.

"She's been a bitch lately."

"She's going through something, Spence."

"What?" Spencer turned to face Emily for the first time since Emily sat down.

"It's… it's not my place to say anything."

"So now you're keeping secrets from me too? I see how it is." Spencer said harshly. She turned back to face forward and shut her eyes tightly; she knew that she shouldn't have been trying to make Emily feel guilty, especially after the secrets that they were keeping from her. Spencer's anger quickly drifted away as Emily stood up to leave, "Em, wait."

"Why? So you can be rude to me some more?"

"Because I'm sorry… You're a good friend, you know that. I shouldn't have said what I did." Spencer said as Emily sat back down, "Aria's right though."

"About what?"

"I was just using Toby…and I-I'm a terrible person, Em and I don't want you to think that I actually lik-."

"Spence," Emily cut her off, not wanting Spencer to beat her self up about something that didn't even matter, "We've talked about this, it isn't your fault. Aria's just pissed off because she has absolutely no sex life and that kissing one of her best friends turns her on."

"That is a scary realization." Spencer chuckled, referring to the first night they kissed in the kitchen. She was thankful for how understanding Emily was, of anything and everything, Emily was simply perfect.

"Let's go back inside so that you and Aria can make up. It's freezing out here, I could use a blanket." Emily began to stand up but Spencer grabbed her arm and pulled her over so she was basically sitting on Spencer's lap.

"You know, I can think of a better way to get warm," Spencer said, her tone was seductive. She tugged off the jacket that Emily was wearing and let her eyes wander across Emily's torso.

Emily leaned in to capture Spencer's lips; they kissed softly as Spencer slid her fingers along Emily's sides. Spencer pulled out of the kiss to quickly unclasp Emily's bra, as it slid off of her body, Spencer took in the sight of Emily's breasts as if it were for the first time, she brushed her fingers lightly around Emily's nipples feeling herself get more and more turned on as Emily whimpered quietly. Emily gently pulled Spencer's chin up to meet her gaze, they stared silently into each others eyes. Just as Spencer was about to kiss down Emily's neck, they were interrupted from a voice somewhere on the ground, "Spencer" Aria yelled.

"Where are you guys?" Hannah followed.

"Damn it." Spencer groaned in frustration. Emily gave her a quick peck on the lips and slid her bra back on. Spencer held up her jacket for Emily to put on, but didn't want to let go of it as Emily tried to grab it. They both laughed at their friends' terrible timing.

* * *

Hours went by, Spencer and Aria made up, apologizing for the direction that things went. They decided that they should probably do something that doesn't involve much thinking which ended up being to watch a movie. It was their usual end to the night. They agreed to watch an old Charlie Brown tape that Spencer left in the VHS a few years back. After squishing together on the couch, Spencer hit play. It didn't take long for Emily to pass out; she was snuggled closely into Spencer's side. And Hannah fell asleep shortly after, she was sprawled across Emily and Spencer's laps, covered in blankets and drooling all over Spencer's leg.

Aria smiled at the sight of her friends, the idea that everything was going to change made her heart ache. The thought that their sleeps over's would never be the same, the possibility that the friendship between them could change because of what was to come. Tears started flowing down Aria's face as she tried to readjust her attention to what was happening on the Television screen.

"Ar, what's wrong?" Spencer asked, snapping Aria out of the deep thoughts that were flowing. She looked over at Spencer, unsure of whether she should tell the truth or make up some reason to satisfy Spencer.

"Nothing, I was just thinking about how perfect this is; the four of us." Aria sniffled quietly.

"We'll always be here, although I could do without the drool." Spencer gestured to Hannah and the noticeable wet spot on Spencer's plaid pajama bottoms.

Aria giggled at the sight of Hannah's awkward position but immediately went back to serious, "What if things change?"

"What do you mean?"

"Once college starts, we'll be leaving each other, things will be different."

"Change can be good you know, honestly, I'm sure we will stick together no matter what happens. I couldn't imagine life without you three." Spencer said, her throat drying up, she stopped talking.

"What if something were to happen to one of us?"

"Aria, nothing, I mean nothing will change our friendship, ever. I promise." Spencer pulled her arm out from being smashed into the couch and wrapped it around Aria, pulling her closer.

"What about a baby?" Aria felt the words come out, but didn't realize that she was saying them.

Spencer looked at Aria; she remained silent for what seemed like a very long time. Aria finally looked away from Spencer's gaze, feeling like she was suffocating, she felt the need to get up. But Spencer put her hand on Aria's leg, stopping her friend from moving, "You… you're pregnant?"

"I-I can explain."

"No need, I'm well aware of how the process works," Spencer chuckled, trying to let Aria know that it wasn't a big deal, even though it kinda was.

"I meant about keeping it a secret."

"Aria, there is no need to explain. You weren't ready to say anything until now. Who else knows?"

"Just Emily, I didn't know how to tell you guys."

"Does Ezra know?" Spencer shifted her body so that she was facing Aria; she was concerned and some what afraid. Yeah, Spencer said that nothing could affect the four of them, but she never considered anyone getting pregnant. It was a scary thought; she couldn't imagine what Aria must be going through.

"No. And I don't think I'm going to tell him. I saw what he went through with Malcolm."

"Exactly, he wanted to be there for his son."

"No, Spence, I can't. I can't have a kid with Ezra and not actually be with him, it would be too hard for the both of us."

"I'm sorry. But you know what, you have us and we'll be here for you to help you raise it." Spencer smiled, hoping that would somehow comfort her, "I am wondering why you haven't told Hannah yet though? I feel like she would be the first to know."

Aria looked over at the sleeping blond; she also wondered why she hadn't told Hannah first, "I don't really know. I guess I'm afraid of what she has to say."

Spencer hesitated at first, unsure of if she should actually ask the question that was roaming around her mind, but she decided that it may be best to just get it out of the way, "Is there… something going on between you two?"

"What? Like romantically?" Aria looked afraid.

"Yeah, I mean, if you don't want to talk about it I unders-"

"Does this have to do with the kiss earlier? Honestly it didn't mean anything. Well okay, it meant something as Hannah is like my best friend and I love her, but not like you and Em type feelings. It just caught me off guard okay." Aria felt anger start rising, she didn't understand where it came from. She didn't like Hannah in _that_ way, yeah she may have thought once of twice about what it might be like to kiss her or be with her, but she didn't have those types of feelings for her. Seriously, none whatsoever.

"Hey, don't get upset. It was just a question."

"Not everyone is gay, Spencer."

"I just thought that it would make sense not to tell her about the baby, if you did have feelings. I meant no harm." Spencer said calmly. It was logical, the thought behind it.

"Well, that's not why."

"I believe you."

They remained silent, Aria felt bad about the way she was speaking to Spencer. With all the hormones rushing throughout her body, she had a hard time controlling her feelings and reactions. But really, the idea that she felt something more for Hannah was absurd, again pregnant hormones are intense and irrational, "I think that I should get some sleep, it's late."

* * *

The four girls awoke to the sound of Spencer's phone ringing loudly. Aria quickly hopped up from the couch to grab it off of the floor, she glanced at the screen to see who the hell was calling at 5am. It was Mrs. Hastings, Aria handed the phone to a half awake Spencer, "Mom?"

"Spencer? Where are you? Are you alright?" Veronica Hastings' voice burst through the cell phones speaker, causing the girls to jump. Hannah sat up and scooted back into her spot on the couch, freeing Spencer to stand up if needed.

"The Lake House, I told you that's where we'd be last night."

"You've been there all night? You, Spencer, Emily and Hannah?"

"Yes, what's wrong?" Spencer's heart was racing, she knew that they must have identified the body; it had to be why her mother was calling so early.

"They found a body in the river last night, this morning they identified it as a young man," Her mother paused, her voice was unsteady, "It's Toby, Spencer..."

* * *

A rather abrupt ending. I know, I know, it is bad writing to kill of a character in order to dismiss them from the story. But Toby needed to die and not just because I don't like him, but because it will tie in with Spemily. Questions, comments, thoughts… anyone?

Plltvdslays: I apologize for not responding to your review on chapter 8, it didn't show up until after I posted for nine. Not quite sure why. Anyway, thanks for reading, it's good to hear from you. (:

Sara1287: It's awesome to know that you are still reading (:

Spemily: I'm glad that Paige and Em's breakup felt intense. I have plans for Paige in the story and I wanted a harsh break between them. Honestly, I'm not the best with romantic type moments, but I hope this chapter was something. Soon, I have ideas for Spemily, but I did want to progress with the plot and such. As you can see that they are yet to discuss where exactly they stand.

Spemilyfan: Your review made me laugh. Thank you for your thoughts about every aspect of the chapter, I'm glad that I got a positive response to impregnating Aria, I thought it would add some stakes for the future of the fic. It's exciting to hear that you are connecting with the story, as a writer that is the number one thing to hear, like seriously. So thank you (:

Cammae: Haha, you idea of Emily giving details to Hannah is great, I actually thought about it briefly, but I couldn't figure out how to write it in there. Sorry. Their will be Spemily time shortly to come, I promise.

Guest: Yay, someone's happy about Em and Arias connection. I think that Aria's character on the show isn't near her potential of what her character should be (if that makes sense). I hoped to show how she connects with the other girls because their friendship is very important. It's really really cool to hear that people are connecting to either the characters or the story, it's very encouraging (:

Dee: I would totally add more 'sexy time' but I do want to progress in the plot. And also, if it were purely that, people would miss the entire idea of Spencer and Emily's relationship, it isn't about physical intimacy, it's about them connecting in every way and that is what makes their relationship real, not just the sex. Sorry to disappoint.

Cassie: Thank you (: To answer your question, I do plan on branching away from the show as far as A and the plot and such, as you can see, I just killed off an important character (and he's really dead, unlike in the show). So I plan to trail off somewhere entirely different and take the characters with me.


	11. Bent But Not Broken

Hey, I was going to post this on Sunday like I mentioned earlier, but we had a massive storm pass through knocking power out throughout every city in my area. Apparently the storm made history in Seattle, or something like that. There was even a tornado touchdown about 30 minutes from my house. It was quite interesting. But once we got power back, I kinda decided to edit the chapter and well, ending up changing basically everything that I wrote and decided to go for a plot progression. It lacks Spemily, but I hope it was worth the wait.

Anyways, enjoy (:

* * *

Spencer sat silently in the chair beside her bedroom window; she stared out into the dark street feeling that maybe it was time to leave her bedroom. That tomorrow morning she was going to call Emily, Hannah and Aria and ask them to meet up with her so that they could talk. The entire week was spent mourning and she still felt broken up over Toby's death, but during that week, Spencer pushed Hannah, Aria and Emily away by refusing to speak with anyone.

The hours after the body was identified, the four girls were called into the Police Station for questioning. Spencer_ was _Toby's girlfriend after all, it was only a procedural questioning, not quite an interrogation, but knowing –A, that was only short to follow. The entire day was a mess, Spencer locked herself in her room after they were released from the questioning and she didn't want to see anyone, period. Things between her and Toby were over long before she kissed Emily that first night in the Lake House, but she still loved Toby, he was the brother she never had, the only man to be consistent in her life. And now, he was gone and she didn't even get to say goodbye.

Spencer felt guilty about the way she reacted to the situation. She knew that Emily was probably hurting just as much as she was, but she couldn't bring herself to see Emily. Spencer was afraid that the way she acted was going to effect things between them; she didn't want Emily to think that she was still in love with Toby, because she wasn't. She just wasn't good at dealing with death, the only way she knew how to cope was to push away anyone that wanted to talk about it. She needed to sort things out in her own mind before she could talk about it with others.

The entire week locked away wasn't a waste though; it gave Spencer the push that she needed to start searching and figuring out things that just didn't add up. Everything that's happened, the letter from Jenna, the night with Emily out of town, things weren't adding up. If Jenna knew something was going to happen to Toby, why wouldn't she have stopped it? Why would see have saved Spencer and Emily's asses from further interrogation by keeping them out of town the night this happened? Why would Jenna care? Answers were starting to appear, slowly but surely. Spencer had more theories and ideas as to what could have gone down and what it continuing to go on. She had a better idea of who was involved and how they could be contributing to the bigger picture. There had to be a bigger picture. She had ideas about that too.

The wind picked up, blowing roughly through Spencer's bedroom window, it blew her hair wildly and flipped a few pages of the book she was reading. Spencer glanced out at the DiLaurentis' house; the curtains to Ali's old bedroom window were blowing wildly from the wind as well. Spencer squinted to see a dark figure blur throughout the room. She stood up just as a lamp flickered on somewhere inside the bedroom, casting a long shadow across the ceiling. That same figure appeared inside the window frame and Spencer's heart sank in her chest. The girl in the window had her long, blond hair pushed to one side and her piercing blue eyes cut through Spencer as they made eye contact, the look in the heart shaped girls' eyes was the same look Spencer had received all those years ago, a challenging look that said "What are you going to do about it". It was only brief glance. Within a blink, the curtains were closed and the lamp that shone inside the room was off, Ali was gone.

* * *

The cold air nipped at Emily's skin as she walked down the sidewalk, streetlights flickered in the distance and leaves crunched beneath her feet. It was fall, October 1st to be exact. It had been exactly one week since Spencer shut her out, well, she shut everyone out but Emily only cared about the fact that Spencer didn't want to see or speak with _her._ She understood what Spencer was going through; Toby and Emily were very close too, so she felt just as broken as Spencer. It was the way that Spencer was dealing with it that hurt Emily.

Emily reacted very differently about Toby's death than Spencer, she pulled Aria and Hannah close and they hadn't spent much time apart over the week. Aria was worried that Emily might react the way that she did when Maya died and Aria nor Hannah were going to let Emily fall into the destructive patterns that took months to break. They tried to help Spencer, but she was very adamant with the fact that she needed to be alone and the other girls respected that.

Emily stopped walking just out side of the Montgomery's drive way, she was getting ready to go inside and sit down with Aria and her family so that Aria wouldn't be alone while telling her family that she's pregnant. She was running out of time, they were going to notice any day now as a small bump was becoming more and more visible on Aria's stomach. Aria asked Emily if she could sit in on the conversation so that her parents would have a bit more composure than they would be if she wasn't there.

The front door opened and Aria walked out slowly, she wore a puffy black coat and a pair of loose jeans that were tucked into a pair of brown boots, it was the most normal thing that Emily's seen Aria wear in years. As Aria was closing the front door, Emily made herself visible to her friend, "Hey Aria, you ready to go inside?"

Aria smiled at Emily as she walked closer, she pulled Emily in for a hug. "Can we go for a walk?" She asked as they pulled out of the embrace.

"Sure but what about your family?" Emily felt confused. Aria went over a long thought out plan earlier that day over the phone. Emily was ready to sit down and receive hateful glares from Byron and Ella as they realized that the secret had been kept for a while and that Emily knew before they did.

Aria gestured that they should start walking while the spoke and Emily followed close beside her, "I told my family, Em, after dinner I couldn't wait any longer." Her voice was steady and Emily took that as a very good sign.

"How did they take it?"

"The veins on my dad's neck looked like they were going to explode as he made the connection that it was Ezra's. I explained that I'm the reason that Ezra and I aren't together and that I want to raise this baby on my own," Aria was met with a concerned smile from Emily, "By my own, I meant without Ezra. My mom was super supportive about the whole thing; she's excited that she's going to be a grandma. And Mike was ecstatic; I've never seen him so excited about anything before, he told me that he would do anything that I needed and that he is going to be the best uncle ever." Aria chuckled.

"I'm glad they took it well, your family is so understanding. Think about it, if I were in your position my parents would lose it."

"I don't really think you have to worry about getting pregnant."

"It was the thought behind it." They laughed. Emily linked Aria's arm with hers as they continued walking.

As they reached the end of Aria's street, they took a right and Emily immediately knew where they were going. Emily felt a surge of relief rush through her body, Aria waited long enough to do this, but she was glad they were going together.

* * *

Spencer bolted downstairs towards the front door; she didn't even bother with her shoes as she didn't want to waste any time. She knew that she wasn't just seeing things, Alison was alive and she was prancing around her old bedroom as if she wanted to be caught. Well, Spencer did catch her and it was about time that she had a word with Ali, she wanted answers.

Tripping briefly over some loose gravel, Spencer rounded the corner of their driveway and made her way to the sidewalk, she wondered if she should go into the DiLaurentis' backyard and get into the house through the back door (or window) or go through the front door. There were no cars in the driveway, meaning she didn't have to worry about Mrs. D and that she would have a better chance to actually catch Ali.

Spencer stopped dead in her tracks as she saw Paige standing a few feet away from her on the opposite side of the DiLaurentis driveway, her plan was ruined. Paige walked closer as Spencer stayed un-moving; the only light shining on them was the light of the full moon. Spencer's eyes flashed to the side yard, she could still bolt and still catch Ali. But was it worth the risk of Paige finding out that Ali was still alive? Paige could already know. She could be the diversion to distract Spencer while Alison made her escape. Right as Spencer turned to head towards the back of the house, Paige yelled, "Spencer, wait!" Paige's voice was shaky, almost unrecognizable. Spencer locked eyes with her, feeling an overwhelming feeling of pain. As the moonlight hit Paige's skin, it sent shivers down Spencer's spine, she wondered if Paige was going to turn into a werewolf and shred her up or something freaky like that, it was the full moon after all.

"We are even now, Spencer."

"What?"

"We both _lost_ somebody that we love." Paige's voice was full of hatred and Spencer knew exactly what she was implying. Spencer's muscles tensed as it took everything in her to not storm towards Paige and beat the shit out of her. She wanted to feel Paige's bones break beneath her fists.

The sound of a sliding glass door opening, snapped Spencer out of her desire to kill Paige, she remembered why she was out there to begin with. She bolted down the DiLaurentis' side yard, feeling the twigs snap beneath her bare feet, she ignored the pain. She could hear foot steps behind her, Paige followed after her.

A figured dressed in all black leaped off of the back porch and headed towards the woods, Spencer followed, as she caught up closer to the figure she caught a glimpse of long hair flowing out from under the hoodie.

"Stop!" Spencer yelled as if it might do something, the figure glanced back briefly at Spencer, but Spencer couldn't get a good look at the face as it was to dark. They dodged in and out of trees and bushes, at some point they had lost Paige in the forest giving Spencer a ping of relief.

As the swerved through the bushes, Spencer felt like they had gone in a circle as she recognized an opening they passed through. They quickly came upon a short fence; the hooded figure swiftly hopped it and landed into somebody's backyard. Spencer lost sight of the figure as she jumped, not nearly as swiftly, over the fence and stumbled onto the ground. Spencer ran towards the side of the house, as she raced into the front yard, she still could get a visual of the person she was following. Spencer figured she should get back to the backyard to see if maybe the other person circled around to the woods. As she turned around, she felt a metal bar crash roughly against her head, knocking her unconscious.

* * *

Hannah paced back and forth throughout her kitchen as a pot of noodles boiled on the stove. She didn't exactly know how she felt at the moment, nervous and excited and confused all at the same time, it was a strange mixture of emotions that she didn't quite understand.

The news that Hannah received that evening was fantastic, her mother would be coming home tomorrow. She was going to be put under house arrest, but that was better than nothing, it meant that they were one step closer to setting her free. With Toby's death, the police (somehow) linked his death to Wilden's investigation. They discovered that whoever killed Wilden was also Toby's murderer. And seeing as Ashley Marin was locked up, they had a new suspect roaming the streets. Ashley wasn't in the clear just yet, as she was still under investigation, but she was going home to Hannah and that's what mattered at the moment.

But there was also the confusion rushing thought Hannah's mind of who could have killed Toby and why? Did he know too much? Did he find something out that took them a step closer to finding out who Red Coat was? Those were the thoughts rushing through Hannah's brain the entire week. But now with the news that the murders were linked, it made less sense than it did before. Why would A kill Wilden? Or was it A? Did they have some other psycho murderer running around killing tall, brown haired men?

Hannah's thoughts were interrupted by a her phone beeping,

**There's a present waiting for you.  
**…**Take a look out back.  
****-A**

Hannah quickly looked around the room; she pulled a knife from out of the case and walked over to the glass door that lead to the porch. She flipped the outside light on and glanced into the backyard. It was too dark to see the entire yard, so Hannah slowly opened the door, "Hello?" She said, hoping that if there was someone out there that they might respond. A cough echoed from near the fence in the back, a figure slowly sat up off the ground. "Show yourself!" Hannah yelled, unsure of why she was even out there in the first place.

"Hannah?" A familiar voice called from the darkness. She could see the rough outline of a person sitting in front of the fence.

"Oh shit, Spencer, are you all right?" Hannah yelled as she ran towards her friend.

"I think so." Spencer coughed again, "I could use some help though." Spencer didn't move, as Hannah got closer her eyes adjusted to the darkness and she could see Spencer a lot more clearly. Spencer sat completely still, her face was covered in dirt and blood dripped from her forehead. Her hands were taped behind her back and an animal collar was wrapped around her neck and the leash was chained to the fence.

As Hannah bent down to help her friend her phone beeped again, she opened it quickly and read it out loud,

**Have you considered getting a dog house?  
****Because you need to keep this bitch on a tighter leash.  
****Kisses,  
****A**

"That's clever." Spencer chuckled at the dark sense of humor, her head ached and she felt content sitting there in the dirt as it hurt to move. It was also a blow to the ego as –A or Ali or whoever the hell that was outsmarted her. They knew that Spencer would follow her, this was the plan and there was no way that Spencer could have caught her.

"What the hell happened?" Hannah asked as she helped untie Spencer's hands and pull the collar off of her neck.

Spencer raised her hand to rub the marks on her neck that the collar had left, she had no idea how long she had been tied up. The last thing she could remember was the feeling of a cold pipe bashing against her skin. She didn't even see who did it. But it had to be Ali, that girl was Ali and Spencer was sure of it.

"I don't exactly know." Spencer stood up and Hannah helped her walk inside.

Once inside Hannah helped Spencer sit down on one of the chairs and got her a cup of water. Hannah pulled her phone out to send an S.O.S to Emily and Aria; the second after she hit send, there was a knock on the front door. Hannah glanced at Spencer and then ran to the front door. Aria and Emily stood outside looking in at a very panic stricken, semi-confused Hannah. "What's wrong?" Aria asked as Hannah stared at them blankly, the colour in Hannah's cheeks was gone and she looked as if she had witnessed something terrible.

"It's Spencer. She's in the kitchen." The tone in Hannah's voice did not match her appearance, it was calm.

Emily and Aria headed into the kitchen and Hannah followed behind them. Spencer smiled lightly, "That was quick." She was referring to the SOS but they didn't get it.

"God, Spence, what happened?" Aria asked, she walked into the kitchen and grabbed a washcloth off of the counter and doused it in warm water.

"Are you alright?" Emily asked. She sat down beside her friend feeling helpless; she rubbed Spencer's shoulder in a comforting way. Hannah sat down on the opposite side of Emily.

"Yeah, my head hurts like hell but I'm fine." Spencer reached for the cloth but Aria batted her hand aside and started rubbing the blood/dirt mixture from Spencer's face.

"What happened?" Aria asked again.

"I saw Ali, in her bedroom window. I swear to god that it was her, she gave me this look… it was daunting and challenging and very much Alison. But after I blinked, she was gone. I ran after her, but was stopped outside the front of the house by Paige; she said something and distracted me. After I heard the backdoor slam, I chased after Ali into the woods and followed her into your backyard where I was knocked unconscious. I woke up tied to the fence." Spencer said. She took another drink of the water, feeling out of breath.

"Wait, you saw Paige?" Hannah asked.

"She was right outside the DiLaurentis' house." Spencer glanced over at Emily, feeling awful about what she was about to say, "She said that we are even now, that we both lost somebody that we love."

"You think she killed Toby?" Aria asked. She was standing over by the sink rinsing the blood out of the washcloth, but she stopped to glance over at Emily. Emily's face was white, she looked sick.

"I wouldn't put it past her, I'm sorry, Em." Spencer said. She rested her hand on Emily's hoping it wouldn't affect her too much.

"I wouldn't either. When we broke up, something about her was different. Her eyes were dark and she… well, it wasn't what she said, but the way she said it. I felt so much hatred radiate off of her… she mentioned Toby though, she told me that you would never leave him and that I'm a pawn, but how could killing him help her in any way?" Emily felt herself losing control of her emotions, she willed herself not to cry. The Paige she knew was loving and selfless, but she did have a dark side and Emily had seen brief glances of it in the past.

"Revenge." Aria muttered.

"What?" Hannah asked from across the room.

"Revenge. It didn't just hurt Spencer, it hurt Emily too and all of us," Aria walked back over to the table and proceeded to clean Spencer's skin. She looked down at Spencer's feet, they were covered in mud and blood and what looked like chunks of rock and pine needles. "Where are your shoes?" Aria's voice was scolding, like a concerned mother.

"I didn't have time. She would have gotten away." Spencer felt embarrassed for the second time this evening.

"How did you guys get here so quickly?" Hannah asked, looking at Emily.

"We were on our way over to begin with, it was perfect timing." Emily smiled. She looked over at Aria, wondering if she still planned on telling Hannah about the baby, especially after everything that happened this evening.

Aria met Emily's gaze, she shook her head as if she knew exactly what Emily was thinking. Aria looked back to Spencer, "Come on, you need a shower."

"You look like you were hit by a bus." Hannah laughed.

"Or a semi," Emily joined her, "A huge ass semi"

"I was thinking a train." Aria laughed too.

Spencer smiled at her friends; she didn't understand how she spent an entire week with out them or how she managed to cope alone. She missed them and hoped that this meant that they weren't upset over the way she responded to Toby's death. Spencer still planned on apologizing but now didn't really seem like the opportune time. There was always tomorrow. Plus she also had a few things that she wanted to discuss with Emily…

* * *

Thought I'd end this chapter here. There is Spemily to come in the next chapter, I already have some of it written (: But I won't be posting for at least a week or so as I do have my other Fic to work on too.

Ninjagojay246: There will be more Haria moments, Aria has to tell Hannah about the pregnancy sooner or later and it will probably be soon… But I can't say if I'm going to turn them into a couple or not yet.

Spemily: Cute Spemily scenes will be in the next chapter, I'm going to focus on them a bit now that the Spoby drama is out of the way.

Guest: Hannah is still with Caleb, even though he isn't mentioned much, but I do have plans for Aria and Hannah, not saying they will be a couple. But… well, you'll see (:

Everlasting: You are incredibly sweet (: I too, wish that I had a Spemily type relationship, I think having a friendship like theirs would be incredible too. I'm sorry to make you question your heterosexuality, it is quite funny though. I personally don't like labels, I think love is love and it doesn't matter what the person's gender is, love is an uncontrollable emotion that likes to hit us in unexpected ways. (: And I can't quite say _who _did it, you will find out soon.


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